Our private contract deliveries are exactly that... Private! This means there's no general public in attendance, and you can connect directly with our team to discuss your needs. From scheduling and seasons, to course format and content — we will work with you to create a training program that covers the skills your team needs in a way that works for them. 

Most course customizations can be included as standard with no additional charges for your organization. For more information — and inspiration! — on the options available, see below.

Almost every NRTG course can be booked as a private contract delivery. For more information on arranging a customized training program, check out this helpful article. 

Make the content relevant

At NRTG, we provide hands-on environmental training. So, it makes total sense that our Program Managers and team of instructors will ensure the materials and skills covered in your program are relevant to the specific environment of your team or community. Depending on your needs — including consideration for active or upcoming projects — it's also possible to adjust the focus of your program, or even swap out some skills for others. This approach ensures the training remains well-rounded whilst developing the skills that are most applicable to your team.

Here's a real example: 

• An organization in the BC Interior wanted to cover amphibian identification specific to their location. The only ID guides they could access covered the entire province of BC so included many irrelevant species.
  🧩Solution: Territory-specific amphibian identification guides created with species at risk highlighted. Guides included as student handouts to support training in the field.

Combine courses to maximize impact

Organizations frequently reach out to us for advice on which NRTG course they should choose for their team. Perhaps they have created a shortlist but can't figure out which would be best to tackle first. Most are thrilled when they hear there's no need to pick one! You can combine several courses to create a tailored program. Combining courses in this way can help reduce overall costs as it's a more efficient use of instructor time and travel expenses (note, this depends on your delivery format).

Here are some common combinations of courses:

• Fish Habitat Assessment plus Streambank Restoration Techniques

• Land Guardian Program including Electrofishing Certification

• Habitat Restoration Technician Program and Fish Habitat Restoration — Instream Techniques

Design your own schedule

When booking your private training, our team will inform you about the preferred (or mandatory) times of year for your chosen training. Whilst many of our courses can be delivered year-round, some have specific regulatory, weather and/or temperature requirements which make them 'seasonal'. Our Program Managers will work with you to schedule training dates that work best for you within the appropriate season. For our longer certificate programs, many organizations opt to spread the training across several months so students can avoid burnout and gain field experience in different seasons. 

We regularly schedule training to meet requests similar to this one: 

• A community in southeast British Columbia wanted to spread out their 5-week Land Guardian Program to comply with their funding conditions whilst ensuring students developed skills for year-round land guardianship. 
  🧩Solution: 3-weeks delivered in winter (Jan and Feb) before their funding activation deadline, plus 2-weeks delivered in spring (Apr) after snowmelt and plants started to grow. 

Pick your preferred training format

Here at NRTG, we deliver training year-round in many formats; in the field, online with a live instructor, or via self-paced online learning modules. From our decades of experience delivering environmental training, we can confidently say that one format is not better than another. Each training format serves a different set of needs, including catering to various learning styles, and adapting to the budgetary needs of your organization. 

Here's how one client leveraged different training formats to keep costs within budget:

• An organization in Saskatchewan wanted to train community members in our Environmental Field Skills Program. The usual 3-week in-person delivery format would have been perfect, but overall program costs were out-of-budget and their community members could not take three full weeks out of work. 
  🧩Solution: The organization funded self-paced access to their chosen program so members could tackle the online modules around their personal schedules. We then worked with the organization to plan a 3-day weekend of in-person field activities with one of our experienced instructors to level up their community's new skills. Getting creative with training format made things more budget-friendly for the client and more schedule-friendly for the students.

Please note, some of our courses have mandatory in-person elements and our self-paced training options are limited (but growing). Ask our Program Managers what formats are available for your chosen training. 

Create something completely new

We encourage our clients to dream big and let us know what their perfect environmental training program would look like, even if it includes topics that are not covered by our existing course portfolio. In the rare case we don't already have what you need in our archives, our Program Managers will determine whether we have the skills in the team to develop entirely new content that brings your training request(s) to life. 

Please note, if we need to develop entirely new content for you, there will be a content development fee added to your program. This fee is variable based on the topic and quantity of content required.