When Juan Bravo was surfing the Web for two-year colleges in America that would prepare him to be a zookeeper and work with exotic animals, he stumbled on a wildlife degree at Haywood Community College, located in a small Appalachian town.

Bravo, who lived in Puerto Rico, enrolled, packed his bags and moved to Haywood County.

“I read some really good reviews on-line,” Bravo said of his decision. “Everything just kept coming back to HCC.”

While most community colleges are just that — colleges that serve their immediate community — the natural resources program at HCC has become a destination for students from all over the United States and beyond.

“The number of students who move here to attend this community college is pretty staggering,” said Jim Hamilton, an HCC forestry instructor. “We offer the best two years of education at any institution in the Southeast in natural resource management.”

HCC’s natural resources students scored major points for the school’s reputation two weeks ago when they brought home third place in the Wildlife Society’s Southeastern Wildlife Conclave — a weekend-long competition among wildlife students from across the Southeast. The students competed in animal calling contests, radio tracking, archery, canoeing, mammal identification, quiz bowl and sundry other categories against 450 students from 16 four-year universities.

“We were the underdogs because we are only a two-year school, so it impressed a lot of people,” said Kasey Straganac, an HCC wildlife student.

The HCC wildlife students came in second in the quiz bowl, competing against universities with graduate students on their team.

“You are sitting there with 450 of the top wildlife students in the United States and holding your own,” said Rick Lindsay, a wildlife instructor with more than a smidgen of pride. Of course, it didn’t help that the team captains of five other universities were former HCC students who transferred to four-year schools.

“We’re the only team that ever has to face our own people,” Lindsay said.

HCC is one of the only colleges in the Southeast accredited by the Society of American Foresters — a claim few universities can make. HCC is also accredited by the North American Wildlife Technology Association.

The reputation of HCC’s natural resources program had a similar impact when recruiting instructors. The college received a $1.7 million federal grant to hire five new instructors — bringing the total to 13 — and two new support staff.

When word of these hirings spread, a queue of candidates quickly came to the college’s doorstep, including Jim Hamilton, one of the new forestry instructors.

“As an extension agent in the mountain counties, I knew a lot of people who went to Haywood and had always heard great things about it,” Hamilton said. “As a forestry student at N.C. State, at all the contests and timber sports events, you would always hear about this community college from the mountains that had a really good showing.”

Hamilton has a diverse background. After doing his doctoral thesis on labor issues in the Christmas tree industry, he served Christmas tree growers in the Boone area through the NCSU cooperative extension. He later moved to Alabama where he did outreach with minority owners of forested lands who had historically underutilized natural resources services.

Buddy Tignor, a new horticulture instructor, left a job at a four-year university in Vermont just shy of reaching tenure. He saw the position advertised in a national journal called Chronicle of Higher Education. Tignor hadn’t heard of HCC. In fact, he didn’t know where it was. He searched for Clyde on Yahoo! maps, saw it was close to Asheville and decided to apply.

“At the largest universities you get split a lot of different ways. I was looking for a 100 percent teaching position,” Tignor said. “When I interviewed here and talked to everyone, it became apparent very quickly they had hired high-quality personnel and the caliber of students was really high. And seeing the awards that the students had won in different competitions made me realize they had a really high-quality program in natural resources.”

Pete Kennedy, a new GIS instructor who mountain bikes and kayaks in his free time, left a community college in Greenville, S.C., to join the staff at HCC. Kennedy has his master’s degree in forest ecology and wanted to integrate the mapping data computer program.

Shannon Rabby, a new forestry instructor, was working for the WNC Sustainable Forestery Initiative at Western Carolina University, but when he heard about the openings he wanted to come back to HCC where he graduated years earlier. Rabby said the program was already on the map in the natural resources world, but the expanded program will push it to the forefront.

“If students across the state knew they could come here and do what they love and get jobs in the outdoors, we are going to see some growth,” Rabby said.

The $1.7 million grant will cover the salaries of the new hires for three years. By then, school officials hope enrollment in the natural resources program will have increased enough to support the salaries. Recruiting students is a big part of the job for the new instructors. They have spread out across the region touting the HCC natural resources program. They’ve given talks in high school classrooms, met with guidance counselors and talked to clubs.

Hamilton said selling a career in natural resources is easy.

“The first question you ask is ‘How many of you want to work outside?’” Hamilton said. “For anyone who enjoys the outdoors and wants the outdoors as their office, a career in natural resources is the way to go. It’s definitely a quality of life career.”

Capturing those who say “yes” to an outdoor career is pretty easy, Hamilton said. HCC has more natural resources instructors than any other two-year colleges and most four-year universities. Classes are smaller and tuition is cheaper than at a university. But the setting seems to be the real trump card.

“Haywood Community College is located in the most mountainous county east of the Mississippi with two national forests and two national parks at our doorstep, and it’s own two forests that we use for outdoor classrooms,” Hamilton said.

Doug Staiger, the director of the natural resources program at HCC, chalks up its success to one factor above all else.

“he strength of our reputation is in our graduates,” said Staiger.