All year we've been celebrating the silver anniversary of the founding of Countryside Jobs Service. And what a year it's been!

2019 has been our birthday.

All year we've been celebrating the silver anniversary of the founding of Countryside Jobs Service.

And what a year it's been!


We've been delighted, amazed and occasionally slightly embarrassed by the lovely things our friends and colleagues have said about us but it's been the unprompted comments from our readers that have really made us know that CJS is something special - not that we ever doubted it, of course.

We received lots of Congratulations and Happy Birthdays and thanks for all the hard work messages:

  • Well done to the team at CJS on your continued invaluable service to those of us slogging onwards & upwards in the wider countryside. Please keep it up! :-)
  • Happy birthday CJS, thank you for the amazing work you do for the environment. Putting people in touch with others who share the same goal of improving the environment and aiding in conservation!
  • Happy Birthday CJS - you have been a part of my life ever since I studied Countryside Management and have been a font of useful information. Thanks!

But it's the ones that mention how we helped get someone started on the their careers or to get a job that really mean the most - it is, after all, what Countryside Jobs Service was founded to do:


CJS you kick started my career with a great volunteer position, got me my first job and continue to inform me about conservation and wildlife news and great job opportunities. Here’s to the next 25 years!


Thank you to everyone. We've collated all the comments here and although our birthday year is nearly over you're welcome to add your comments (email is the easiest way).

We'll leave the comments and the articles written by past and present CJS editors, Niall and Kerryn, on the website as part of our digital archive - at least until our next big birthday.


Presents!

We've also been accepting and giving away birthday presents; the Conservation Handbook from TCV and Forestry England membership packages were exceptionally popular, as was the bundle of gifts from Big Wild.

This month we're giving away CJS subscriptions again, there will be a lucky dip for another 25 annual email subscriptions - one of the January winners got a job and kindly passed on her subscription to a friend, you could do the same. Simply send us your name and email address and at the end of the month we'll pull the names of the lucky winners out of a hat (OK, use a random number generator but you get the gist!). Take part here.


Into the future…

Our birthday year may be over but we will continue to publish all the jobs, news, volunteers and information and to develop CJS to become even bigger and better whilst remaining completely focused on what's relevant for our readers. With that in mind we will be running our readership surveys next year. Now that the website is finally (everyone heave a huge sigh of relief) compete and live we can turn our attention to some other projects that are waiting in the wings.