SEA Semester in the News
ESF Student Participates in SEA Semester
Mary Zarba conducts research aimed at protecting rare coral wilderness
SUNY ESF News

College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF) student Mary Zarba is currently sailing with SEA Semester on a scientific research voyage to the remote Phoenix Islands in the Pacific Ocean.

SEA Semester in the News
Woods Hole Sea Grant Sponsors Two 2020 Knauss Finalists
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Two candidates sponsored by the Woods Hole Sea Grant program are among the finalists for the 2020 class of the of the John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship program. The announcement was made on July 24 by NOAA and the National Sea Grant College Program.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
Evidence and patterns of tuna spawning inside a large no-take Marine Protected Area, Scientific Report
Tuna are Spawning in Marine Protected Areas, MIT News

Can protected marine sanctuaries like the Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA) benefit highly migratory species, like tuna? That’s the topic of a report recently published in Scientific Reports.

It’s been ten years since the Woods Hole Diversity Initiative launched the Partnership Education Program (PEP) in 2009. The 11th PEP cohort, which numbers 14 students, recently completed their classroom work at SEA, as well as a short cruise aboard the SSV Corwith Cramer, and are now living on the SEA campus while they do internships at scientific organizations in Woods Hole.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
“Why Waves of Seaweed Have Been Smothering Caribbean Beaches”
By Ed Yong
The Atlantic

Since 2011, blooms of Sargassum have wreaked havoc on tropical shores. A new study explains why this is likely a new normal.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
“BU Researchers Find Another Threat For Corals: Plastic”
WBUR
By Barbara Moran

“Boston University biologist Randi Rotjan has been studying coral reefs for more than a decade. A couple years ago, she started to notice tiny bits of plastic ‘in all of our samples from everywhere,’ she says. To understand how corals grow, she decided she was going to have to study how plastic gets into their bodies, how much is there and how it affects them.”

The expedition continues!  Jonathan Harris, C-112, winner of the 2019 Armin E. Elsaesser III Fellowship, has added a number of blog posts and photographs chronicling his ongoing research project, “Pirates, Blockades and Commerce: an expedition to explore the maritime history, fortifications, and lighthouses of the Gulf Islands National Seashore.”

SEA Semester in the NEWS

“Oberlin Students Engage in Experiential Learning at Sea”
by Erin Ulrich ’18
Oberlin News

Founded in 1971, Sea Education Association (SEA) is a nonprofit organization that provides college students with interdisciplinary learning opportunities through its study abroad program, SEA Semester.

Students enrolled in SEA Semester programs study ocean-related themes within the broader context of humans’ impact on the natural world.

This past spring semester, Mechteld (Mecky) Kuijpers ’20 conducted research aboard the SSV Robert C. Seamans, a 134-foot Pacific research brigantine. Through SEA Semester: Oceans and Climate, Kuijpers and a group of students from the United States and international colleges and universities sailed from New Zealand to Tahiti over the course of six weeks.

A great experience at SEASCape: SEA Science on the Cape, SEA’s high school summer program in Woods Hole, inspired one recent alumna to share what she learned about plastic pollution in the ocean, and in doing so, to give back to SEA!

On Wednesday, two of SEA Semester’s most recent alumni, Cecilia Howard (Johns Hopkins University) and Andrew Meashaw (SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry), who sailed this spring on the Marine Biodiversity & Conservation Program (C-285), joined their professors, Dr. Kerry Whittaker and Dr. Porter Hoagland, to serve on a panel and make a presentation at a meeting of the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development at the United Nations in New York.