Today is the last day of SEASCape. there were mixed emotions of thankfulness to go home, and sadness for leaving a bunch of new and incredible friends.

Today we had a guest speaker, Amy Kukulya, a leading engineer behind shark cam at WHOI. She talked to us about her career pathways and aspirations in engineering and other fields such as environmental policy. She described many difficulties she has had to face in the field, like being the only female in a white male environment. Her talk was very inspirational and eye-opening for all of us.

Today we went on the Plymouth Whale Watch. While boating out to the shelf, where whales usually to go get food, we saw a calf and her mother. The mom’s name was Venom and was nursing the baby whale, Diad.

Today was a day for leisure, recreation, and taking it easy. Our day started off normally enough, except for the fact that we could finally sleep in after a long week of fun, we got up around 10:15 and ate brunch. After that we did some tie-dye, which was fairly quick.

We started off our day with breakfast and went straight to Oceans and Society class. We discussed the creation of cargo ships and the impact they have on today’s society. This discussion was closely related to our lesson about marine mammal sounds and noise pollution.

Today for our trip to Boston, we got up 30 minutes earlier to get ready for a 2-hour school bus ride. The first place we stopped at was the USS Constitution Museum. Here we learned about the vessel, and learned about its rich history.

First thing today we had a lesson on climate change and discussed on how it has changed the ocean and the environment. We also discussed the social and political impacts of climate change, we saw a documentary about the current disputes on the fishing and oil industries in countries including Norway, Ireland, and Canada.

Today we had a class of marine chemistry and tested Ph samples of freshwater, salt water and salt water with a high concentration of baking soda while adding CO2 for 30 second intervals to check the difference between the Ph levels each time to demonstrate the effect of climate change on the ocean.

We started the day off with an early morning breakfast. After we finished our food and all of our chores we departed for New Bedford around 9:00 A.M and got to the New Bedford Whaling museum at 10:00 A.M. While there we roamed around looking at tools used in whaling, whale bone, etc.

Today was the first non-academic day of the program and of course everyone was very excited! We started the day at 9:45, a major difference from the usual 7:30. Jamie also made us a wonderful brunch and we left soon after to go candlepin bowling, which has smaller pins and balls.