Before coming to UCMP, Erica Clites — currently working on an NSF-funded project to rehouse and digitally image the orphaned USGS Menlo Park invertebrate collection out at the Regatta facility in Richmond — spent about two and a half years with the National Park Service. In 2010 she coordinated a nationwide outreach effort for the first NPS-sponsored National Fossil Day, which was held on October 16th this year. Read an interview with Erica about her work with the NPS on the Park Service’s National Fossil Day website.

While at the NPS, Erica worked with Vince Santucci of the NPS Geologic Resources Division. At the same time, Vince was helping UCMP with its “Fossils in US National Parks” module on The Paleontology Portal website; he provided much of the park and fossil data necessary to create the module, which, by the way, was made in support of National Fossil Day.