Skyler Singleton, currently an education technician park ranger with Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, had her first gig with the National Park Service (NPS) in 2016 as a high school senior.
That summer internship through the nonprofit American Conservation Experience was at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and opened up a world of possibilities into the type of work Singleton would later find so much passion and fulfillment in pursuing.
A 2021 graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Singleton majored in history and political science, adding that she always liked understanding the “why” behind how systems worked.
Singleton soon realized that she liked being able to convey why people should be passionate about something, whether it was concerning certain issues or places. A lot of what political science is, Singleton explained, is communicating why people should care about things.
“I didn’t particularly like doing it in politics necessarily as much, but I really like doing it in regards to our public lands and waters,” Singleton said. “So it was kind of taking all the things I learned in political science and history and then being able to apply them for national parks interpretation and education. It just really works well because it’s explaining to people who may not have any knowledge why this place is cool and why we should care about it… Parks are in everyone’s backyard, so how can you help protect your backyard?”
A cross-country trip after graduation that included visiting different national parks with a good friend also further established Singleton’s passions and future working for NPS. During the road trip, Singleton visited the Grand Canyon for the time and completed a 14-mile-long hike. Singleton said for the majority of the time, she talked her friend’s ear off about facts of the area as she had prepared for the trek by reading numerous books on what to expect.
“I did this same thing at every park we went to. I’m just regurgitating fun facts at her, which is just my general way of being, and she was like, ‘you’re a better park ranger than the actual park rangers,’” Singleton recalled. “So that was kind of the moment where I was like, ‘oh wait, I could actually do this job, this actually does seem really fun to me.’” In 2022, Singleton got her first official position wearing the “green and gray,” taking on the job as an interpretive park ranger at Great Smoky Mountains National Park. She would move around parks in the years after that, getting her first education intern position with Sleeping Bear Dunes in the winter of 2023. After completing the winter internship, she left for another interpretive park ranger position at Canyonlands National Park in Utah, later returning to Leelanau County in the winter of 2024 to do what she does today.
“I feel like everything I have done has kind of led me to want to wear the silly hat that you get to wear as a park ranger,” she said. “Growing up, my family did a lot of road trips, we’re very outdoorsy, so at every park we would go to, I would get the junior ranger badge.”
Park rangers are some of the, if not the most, passionate people when it comes to protecting and educating people about public lands and waters, Singleton said, so working at one ended up being a great fit for her own career endeavors.
“I got to shout out to all the other park rangers, ranging from our maintenance crews to our law enforcement to our resource protection staff,” she said. “Everyone is working to make it so that our park continues to operate in a way that when you arrive, you know this place is special… everything is done coming from a place of love, and I think that’s what’s just so special about it. And there’s always something to do — come watch the stars, come see a sunset, come see a sunrise — it’s there for you, we’re just the caretakers of it.”
Singleton grew up in western North Carolina in a town called Cullowhee, located in the heart of the Appalachian Mountains. Despite growing up in the Carolinas, Singleton and her family would make a point to travel back to their family roots in Leelanau County almost every summer.
Singleton’s grandfather and great-grandmother previously moved away from Leelanau to Chicago, but her grandfather would also spend every summer coming back to spend time with other extended family around town. When Singleton’s grandfather started a family and had her father and his siblings, they also took on the tradition of traveling back to Leelanau in the summer to spend time at their Elmwood Township property. Today, Singleton is living at the family cottage as she now works fulltime in the county.
“The house I live in now is 100-years-old, and it was built by my great-great-auntie Beth (Lingle) in the 1920s,” she said. “I’m the fifth generation of folks who have lived here on the Leelanau Peninsula since the 1870s… I’ve got four separate cousin-family units within walking distance and still on the same parcels of property that have been in the family since the 1800s.”
One of Singleton’s favorite parts about living in the region has been watching the seasons change. Weather permitting, Singleton said she often walks down to the family dock just to observe how the water moves. Living up north for a longer period of time, she’s been able to take in and appreciate the beauty of her surroundings, whether it’s frozen over during the winter season or in the middle of the summer.
“Now I get to go down there and birdwatch, I have a whole kit, I take my binoculars down and look at everything — watching the loons swim by, I’ve been watching them start to make their nest,” she said. “There's tons of really amazing things about Leelanau County that I love, but I think something that I find really special is just being able to sit and notice the little things and feel connected to the world and landscape around me in a way that very few places I think are able to afford you that luxury and opportunity.”
