Today we woke up at 6:30 and after the usual chores, we had our watch meetings and learned how to tie a bowline knot. While some of us were able to complete the knot right away, some struggled to tie it. The RA’s challenged some of us to tie the knots in weird and creative ways such as, tying it behind the back, with our feet, and by closing our eyes.

A very wise friend once gave me this advice (I think we were talking about chairs):  “You’ve got to know when to hold them, know when to fold them. Know when to walk away, and know when to run.” He was trying to wax philosophically about how chairs were like life in general. Now it’s my turn.

I could feel my hands getting clammy as I got off the Peter Pan bus in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. It was 9:30 PM and in a couple minutes, I was going to be greeted by Dr. Adrienne George.  While waiting for Dr. George, I was lucky to have met another PEP student, Lynnette. Lynette and I were both from the UC system and we both knew what an honor it was to be selected into the Partnership Education Program. On our way to the SEA campus, I couldn’t help but smile.

Standing at the helm, I grasp two spokes of the ship’s wooden steering wheel, when the order comes: “Course ordered 355, steering 005.” I recite the order, following ship’s protocol, knowing full well it will send us directly into the path of an oncoming squall. I turn the wheel a quarter turn until the bow points directly toward the looming wall of black clouds.

I can see black streaks on the horizon, curtains of rain spilling out of sky. The junior watch officer barks out commands in preparation for the oncoming deluge.

Ahoy!

We are fourteen students from institutions around the world coming together to sail across the tropical North Atlantic Ocean. Our six-week shore component studies have just concluded, with classes in Nautical Science, Oceanography and Marine Policy. Within the next few days we will start our highly anticipated voyage, with the opportunity to put our practical nautical science skills to use and complete our scientific projects.

How do you feel about rainy days? I have a hunch that most of you are like me, and far prefer prefer blue skies to drizzle and rain. Yet it is a pretty indulgent relationship with water, something we can afford thanks to municipal water supplies and secure access to it. Something that can quickly make this fact plain to us is a trip to an atoll island pretty much anywhere. I remember waking up to the sound hard rain hammering the tin roof of my friend Herve’s house on the island of Rangiroa in French Polynesia some years ago.

SEA Semester® in the News:
“Studying Out on the Open Ocean”
By Amy Laskowski | Feb. 18, 2016

Siya Qiu didn’t know the difference between a jib and a bowsprit when she decided to spend a semester studying aboard the research vessel SSV Corwith Cramer. But after a six-week voyage that took her from Spain’s Canary Islands to St. Croix in the Caribbean, Qiu (CAS’17), a marine science major, soon became well versed on what it’s like to live at sea.  Read the full story.

It’s hard to describe a day that starts with a 4:45am trip to the fish market and ends with sunset sailing on the bow of an ancient Polynesian replica double hulled canoe. The floodlit bustle of cold fish slapping countertops was one of the more surreal wakeups I have experienced. To say that our little group of camera flashing college students felt out of place would be an understatement, but the vendors were happy to point out parrot fish neatly spear caught in nearby reefs, whole and glistening yellowfin tuna, and giant dinner plate slabs of albacore steak two inches thick.

A major theme of both our science and policy work has centered on climate change, specifically how small islands nations like Kiribati can proceed in the face of quickly changing oceans. We’ve talked about the consequences of coral bleaching, acidification, ocean temperature increase and, most interesting to me, how the sovereignty of the small islands nations could be effected if the atolls are submerged by sea level rise.

For Immediate Release: October 30, 2014


Woods Hole, MA— This fall, undergraduate students from top colleges and universities nationwide are utilizing the newly created Ocean Health Index to explore environmental issues related to climate change, conservation, and sustainability of the world’s oceans in a groundbreaking new study abroad program offered by Sea Education Association. SEA Semester: The Global Ocean, is the first undergraduate program in the world to incorporate metrics of the Ocean Health Index – a comprehensive, global evaluation of the human impact on the world’s oceans – into curriculum. Following a highly selective application process, these forty-four students are spending six weeks on shore at SEA Semester’s campus in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and six weeks at sea, sailing as crew and scientists onboard SEA Semester’s state-of-the-art ocean research vessels, operating in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.