We offered our first internships in 1995 as a result of interest generated from our overseas GIS trainings in Russia. Along with giving on-site trainings in and bringing donated software, we decided to provide internships at our GIS lab in Missoula to specialists in need of advanced GIS facilities to assist them with their conservation projects.

Our first interns in 1995 were Sergei Krasnopeyev and Tatiana Sapozhnikova from the Pacific Institute of Geography in Vladivostok, a research facility engaged with many conservation projects in the Russian Far East. Our intern in 1996 was Valery Kulikov, the GIS Manager for the Wildlife Fund in Khabarovsk. Kulikov was selected as an intern in order to aid the Fund's Siberian tiger research and habitat protection.

Also in 1995-96 several other conservationists from Russia involved in partner projects with American conservation organizations visited our GIS lab and received introductory GIS training.