With the start of the new year, we are introducing a series of articles by Sea Education Association faculty and staff titled “Study Abroad and the Sea: Perspectives on Climate Change and the Ocean Environment.”  The series is a diverse and varied examination of relevant ocean topics for college students interested in ocean research and policy.  The first of this series examines the value of ocean literacy by SEA Assistant Professor of Oceanography Kerry Whittaker.

Here, on this last day of 2019, I find myself reflecting on another year as Oceanography Faculty with SEA.  Even today, gazing out onto snow falling along the New England coastline and piling onto branches, railings, and roofs, my mind can easily jump back to the quarterdeck of the Robert C. Seamans carried by the humid trade winds of the South Pacific, or aloft on the Corwith Cramer as we glide through the Bermuda blue water.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
“Lancaster native studies human impacts on coral reefs”
by Holly N. Lipka, Editor
Lancaster Bee

Coral reefs have existed on earth for millions of years, but many of them may not survive much longer.
According to the World Wide Fund for Nature, roughly one-quarter of coral reefs worldwide are already considered damaged beyond repair, with another two-thirds under serious threat.

The Woods Hole Partnership Education Program is seeking applicants for its 10-week summer program in 2020. The program is supported by six science institutions in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and recruits talent from all backgrounds but especially from minority groups that are underrepresented in marine and environmental sciences.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
“When We See Whales” - Transcribing Captain Lawrence’s Logbook
By Mia Sigler, S-283
Sea History Magazine, Winter 2019-20

Mia Sigler, a senior at Mount Holyoke and alumna of SEA Semester class S-283, the Global Ocean, has written a detailed account of the research she and her classmates did on the logbook of Falmouth whaleman Capt. Lewis Lawrence.  Mia helped transcribe the logbook, studied an original chart from Lawrence’s 1849 voyage, and she and her class followed portions of Capt. Lawrence’s path in the South Pacific in the fall of 2018.

SEA Semester in the NEWS
ESF Student Participates in SEA Semester
Emily Klimczak conducts research in the Caribbean
SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry News

SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF) student Emily Klimczak is currently on an ocean research voyage to study human impacts on Caribbean coral reef ecosystems.

With the recent volcanic eruption in New Zealand, we wish to report that all is well aboard the Robert C. Seamans.  The students and crew of class S-289 remain safe aboard the vessel which, though operating near the Bay or Plenty, is well clear of the eruption at White Island.

As his research draws to a close, Jonathan Harris, C-112, winner of the 2019 Armin E. Elsaesser III Fellowship, has posted additional coastal photographs and information on his project website, “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
Work Hard, Get the Job Done, Be Yourself: Jeanne Grasso
USCG Proceedings Magazine
Pioneers & Prodigies edition

Leading maritime lawyer Jeanne Grasso, W-83, credits SEA Semester for influencing her successful legal career.

“When the readers of this edition of Proceedings realize Jeanne Grasso is a lawyer, they will have to fight the urge to flip past and dismiss her as not a ‘real’ mariner. No, Grasso did not graduate from a maritime academy. Nor has she been in command of a ship, but her love affair with all things maritime led her to become one of the United States’ premier maritime lawyers….

SEA Semester in the NEWS
“Tall Ship Experience Helps Student Navigate Her Future”
By Fariss Samarrai
UVA Today

Katherine Webber, a third-year environmental sciences major at the University of Virginia minoring in global sustainability, recently completed a six-week learning adventure aboard a tall ship research vessel, the SSV Robert C. Seamans, in the South Pacific. She conducted field research for NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center on a newly formed volcanic island, collected ocean data while at sea, and learned about Polynesian culture.

BOOK REVIEW: Ahab’s Rolling Sea: A Natural History of Moby-Dick
by Richard King, SEA Visiting Associate Professor, Maritime History and Literature
“Pursuing the White Whale, A briny exploration of Melville’s greatest work”
By William Howarth
The American Scholar

“In September 1891, retired District Inspector No. 75 for the Port of New York died at home on East 26th Street. Literati shrugged. Herman Melville, once known as ‘the man who lived with cannibals,’ was an antique footnote from the age of sail. His Pacific swashbucklers, Typee and Omoo, were long out of print, and his meandering seaborne epic Moby-Dick sank on publication in 1851, taking his writing career with it.”