A good organization is like a complex tapestry. The parts of the fabric are all connected and are made up of many different threads which are woven into segments that tell the story. Liberty Wildlife is very much like this. The rehabilitation story is inextricably connected to the education tale, and both of these flow into the research and conservation agenda with each aspect telling its part of the whole story. Each person, each animal, each concerned public, each donor provides a thread to contribute to the beauty of the piece. As in a beautiful tapestry there are a few threads that wind unchanged through the entire piece strengthening it, bringing consistency to all of the parts—binding it all together. At Liberty Wildlife Jan Miller is one of those threads. If you are a regular reader of This Week at Liberty you see her everywhere. She oversees medical services so every animal that comes in gets touched by her at some point—and, let’s not forget her constant involvement with the volunteers in this area for whom she is responsible. She works closely with the education group in the care and maintenance of the education ambassadors as well as with the training of both volunteers and animals. She can also be seen assisting the Research and Conservation group digging burrows for relocation of burrowing owls, assisting with the relocation of big horn sheep, or educating and assisting utility linemen. In between all of these assignments she hands out advice and answers to Hotliners with arcane questions and helps dispatch rescues or transports that are problematic. She is simply the “go to” person whenever there is a stumper. And that just scratches the surface of her entwinement through our tapestry. When I taught school it was a constant barrage of Ms. Mosby, Ms. Mosby, Ms. Mosby (with an occasional Ms. Lady thrown in for good measure), to the extent that at the end of the day I would consider the possibility of changing my name. At Liberty Wildlife it’s “Hey Jan, Jan, I have a question, Jan could you give me a hand, Jan could you help me with this?” She might want to consider changing her name, but we won’t let her, because she is Jan, our tie that binds. Jan, you rock!
