Sixteen college students from around the country are participating in this year’s Woods Hole Partnership Education Program. It offers the same basic content and growth experiences as in past summers, but unlike the past this year’s program is virtual.

Students in Nautical Science and Leadership spent the first class getting oriented to their own surroundings.  Each figured out their Latitude and Longitude, as well as where North is relative to their home.

After four years as Board Chair of Sea Education Association, Dr. Richard Cost passed the gavel to Dr. Jessica McWade at the SEA Annual Meeting, held on Zoom on Sunday, June 28th.

July 2, 2020

This is SEA’s second statement on Black Lives Matter.  We listened to many alumni and staff who told us that our first statement failed to rise to the level of the crisis engulfing our nation. Thank you to those who reached out for helping us do better.

In response to travel restrictions and health guidelines related to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sea Education Association (SEA) has revised fall programs, shifting all operations to coastal U.S. Atlantic waters aboard our flagship vessel, the SSV Corwith Cramer with no international travel or port stops required.

SEA Semester Assistant Scientist Emily Burke, the recipient of the 2020 Armin E. Elsaesser III Fellowship Award, has begun exploring the rugged coastline of Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula for her Elsaesser project, “Canvas and Ice: A Sailing Study of Alaska’s Changing Fjords.” She has created a website and will soon begin posting updates.  We encourage you to follow her progress!

When they visited the island of Kanton in the Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA) two summers ago, SEA Semester students of Class S-281 quickly became friends with the schoolchildren there, playing frisbee and soccer after dinner, dancing, and taking pictures.

As we are rapidly approaching San Diego, a lot of us are trying to figure out what this voyage means to us and what things will be like when we arrive. When you sail a lot, you are used to missing out. I’ve been at sea for elections, friend’s weddings, several births, a death in the family, the events in Charlottesville in 2017, the Pulse massacre in 2016, and now, in 2020, for both COVID and the George Floyd murder and subsequent protests.

Normally, at this time of the year, SEA’s campus would be welcoming the incoming class of college students enrolled in the Woods Hole Partnership Education Program, or PEP, for short. But this summer is different.  Instead of welcoming students in person, on Monday afternoon, they received a warm welcome via Zoom!

I bet you are thinking to yourself. “Self, after 55 days on board (most of them at sea) what could the crew possibly be talking about at this point?” (Copyright @ Chris Nolan)