Topic 2: Promote lifelong ocean education

The Bridge: Marine Education Clearinghouse

Lead PI: Dr. Frances Lee Larkin, Virginia Institute of Marine Science

The Partnership will develop a web-based resource center and clearinghouse, called “The Bridge,” that brings together marine educators, academia, private industry, and government in support of quality marine education. “The Bridge” will provide educators with a comprehensive source of accurate and useful information on global, national, and regional marine science topics, and provide researchers with a contact point for their educational efforts.

Requested Funding: $0.34M

Partners:

National Marine Educators Association
Sea Grant Educators Network
Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary

For more information on this project, click here.

Enhancing K-12 Science Education Via Satellite-Televised Interactive Technologies

Lead PI: Dr. Paula Coble, University of South Florida

Several successful K-12 outreach and teacher training programs in ocean science at the University of South Florida will be expanded and enhanced through NOPP funding. Funding of a residential component for the Oceanography Camp for Girls, and the Oceanography Institute for Teachers will enable broader participation by teachers and students from around the state and heighten the level of interest and achievement in both groups of participants. Funding will also provide for continuation and expansion of Project Oceanography, a live interactive TV broadcast for middle school students.

Requested Funding: $0.5M

Partners:

University of South Florida
Pinellas County Schools
Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Duval County Schools
Delavan-Darien School District
Ft. Wayne County Schools
Idaho State University
Florida Department of Environmental Protection
Tampa Educational Cable
Sacramento Educational Cable
Regional Educational TV Network

For more information on this project, click here.

JASON IX: Descending the Ocean Ladder – Expanding Student and Teacher Access to Ocean Science Research

Lead PI: Dr. Robert Ballard, Jason Foundation

The Partnership plans to develop and implement a program that will transmit video, audio, and research data from an expedition in the East Pacific Rise to students and teachers in the United States and abroad via the JASON Project’s advanced curricular and educational Internet systems. The project is comprised of four goals: (1) bringing students and teachers in direct contact with researchers participating in the 1998 planned East Pacific Rise expedition through interactive technologies such as the Internet and live-video feeds; (2) creating permanent interactive links with researchers at the Monterey Bay Research Aquarium, Mote Marine Laboratory, Bermuda Biological Research Station and the Institute for Exploration to facilitate communications and student access to research information; (3) creating a permanently accessible set of ocean-oriented interactive Internet and curricular resources for use at the K-12 level; and, (4) expanding the reach of the JASON Project’s advanced interactive delivery system, creating new statewide interactivity centers in Mississippi, South Carolina, Nebraska, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.

Requested Funding: $1.1M

Partners:

Jason Foundation for Education, Waltham, MA
University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI
National Geographic Society, Washington, DC
EDS Corporation, Plano, TX
Sun Microsystems
Mote Marine Laboratory, Sarasota, FL
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Moss Landing, CA
Institute for Exploration, Mystic, CT
Bermuda Biological Research Station, St. George’s, Bermuda
University of Nebraska at Lincoln, Lincoln, NE
U. S. Navy
J. L. Scott Marine Education Center
Bridgewater State College
Connecticut State Department of Education
National Aeronautics and Space Administration

For more information on this project, click here.

Bringing the Ocean into the Precollege Classroom Through Field Investigations at a National Underwater Laboratory

Lead PI: Dr. Michael P. De Luca, Rutgers University, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences

Through their institution’s existing education programs and use of an undersea observatory (LEO-15), the Partnership will engage students in real-time science in a manner that helps them develop problem solving and critical thinking skills that are essential to interpret, analyze, and communicate information. Goals of the Partnership include enhancing educator capability in science content and skills; immersing school systems in an active learning process; and, developing an instructional module to produce a cadre of educators capable of disseminating experience, information, and techniques gained through training at LEO-15.

Requested Funding: $0.1M

Partners:

Rutgers University, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences
National Undersea Research Center (NOAA)
National Estuarine Research Reserves (NOAA)
Bell Atlantic, Absecon, NJ
Virginia Institute for Marine Science
Naval Oceanographic Office, Stennis Space Center, MS
GPU Nuclear, Inc.
Southern Ocean County Consortium
Ocean County Environmental Alliance
Falmouth School District
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Mid-Atlantic Eisenhower Consortium

COAST: Consortium for Oceanographic Activities for Students and Teachers

Lead PI: Dr. Sharon Walker, University of Southern Mississippi

COAST is a partnership designed to effectively deliver oceanographic and coastal processes education from kindergarten through the post graduate level. The COAST partners can provide a broad spectrum of means, methods and materials for ocean science education and a nation-wide telecommunications infrastructure. Each partner is involved in ongoing ocean research through formal and informal teacher education. By joining together to form the COAST partnership, a stronger network providing hands-on experience aboard research vessels, through Web-based instruction, curriculum resources and video-tele-conferencing, to computational science and visualization has been created.

Requested Funding: $2M

Partners: