October 2010 - Subscription Service, Ocean Zoning, Our Ocean Space, and Educational Programs at Sea

THE W₂0 SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE

Through aquariums, science centers, maritime museums, and environmental organizations, the ocean community is estimated to be over 500 million persons worldwide. These organizations are an essential network for the global distribution of ocean information. 

But how? With what tools? And at what cost given the expense of creating video, educational materials, and other interpretive resources?
At the recent meeting of the World Ocean Network at Nausicaa, the French National Aquarium in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France, The World Ocean Observatory announced the availability of a new, subscription-based service that will provide such products at a low incremental cost, pro-rated and shared among multiple users. Content modules, provided twice a year on major ocean themes, will contain: one original and one curated HD film that can be used in theaters and exhibits and on kiosks and websites; two live web-based interactive events with field researchers; a supplemental educational resource package for program use; and a publicity widget to promote, measure, and evaluate audience response and interest.

The first module addresses Ocean & Climate and is available for distribution in Fall 2010. The service is an excellent opportunity for local sponsorship to underwrite the economical subscription fee.

You are invited to augment your institutional interpretive resources through these services. Future module themes will include Ocean Biodiversity, The Ocean and Human Health, The History of International Oceanography, and Nautical Archaeology.

For additional information, and to subscribe, please contact director@thew2o.net.

OCEAN ZONING:
Making Marine Management More Effective
By W₂O Science Advisor, Dr. Tundi Agardy

In her new publication, Ocean Zoning – Making Marine Management More Effective (Earthscan, 2010), Dr. Tundi Agardy, Executive Director of Sound Seas, Director of the MARES Program at Forest Trends, and Science and Policy Director of the World Ocean Observatory, argues clearly and cogently for a paradigm shift: ocean zoning as an up-scaled, enhanced, and integrated system that “overcomes the shortcomings of small-scale protected areas; recognizes the relative ecological importance and environmental vulnerability of differing areas; allows harmonization  with terrestrial land-use and coastal planning; better articulates private sector roles, responsibilities, and market opportunities; minimizes conflict between incompatible uses; and moves us away from fragmented sectoral efforts towards integrated and effective ecosystem-based management that fully includes all uses of, and impacts on, the oceans.”

Dr. Agardy goes on to assert that zoning is simple, straightforward, systematic, and strategic and that it clarifies rights and creates shared management responsibilities. The parceling of the ocean into areas according to their human-use values is radical and certainly difficult in the face of vested interests, conventional thinking, and local, regional, national, and international politics, but it provides “a framework that can evolve out of existing use patterns and cooperative agreements toward meeting the larger goals of biodiversity conservation, conservation of rare and threatened species, maintenance of natural ecosystem functioning at a regional scale, and management of fisheries, recreation, education, and research in a more coordinated and complimentary fashion. The integrated approach inherent in zoning is a natural response to a complex set of ecological processes and environmental problems and is an efficient way to allocate scarce time and resources to combating the issues that parties deem to be most critical.”

Ocean zoning will be, no doubt, as controversial as it is frequently on land. But there are serious benefits to be earned through economies of scale, pro-rated costs, reconciliation of competing interests, and more effective conservation. The need is there. We must adopt such novel tools if we are to truly meet the insistent challenges the ocean now presents, to reverse degradation and improve ocean health.

To order your copy of Dr. Agardy's book, contact Earthscan.

OUR OCEAN SPACE:
An International Ocean Educational Exchange
W₂O announces a forthcoming web-based network for exchange of projects, art, audio-visual presentations, and other imaginative formats, created and up-loaded by teachers and young Citizens of the Ocean to share with their counterparts worldwide.

OUR OCEAN SPACE will encourage classrooms around the world to post ocean-related research and educational projects in PowerPoint format (to include reports, art and photography, audio and video). W2O Editors will review proposed postings for appropriate content and clearance. Our intent is to share these projects with other classrooms around the world, to extend young peoples’ knowledge and awareness of ocean issues, and to establish connections between teachers and students around the world.

OUR OCEAN SPACE will go live shortly. In the meantime, we are seeking inaugural postings to seed the project. If, as an educator, you are aware of such projects please submit them to director@thew2o.net for inclusion as part of our launch.

NOW ENROLLING! ACCREDITED EDUCATION AT SEA
Offered by the OCEAN CLASSROOM FOUNDATION (OCF)

FOR U.S. HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS

OCF Discovery High School Semester is a complete spring semester at sea for high school sophomores, juniors, seniors, and post-graduates exploring the Western North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea aboard the schooners Harvey Gamage, Spirit of Massachusetts and Westward.  Accredited by Proctor Academy in Andover, New Hampshire, Discovery High School Semester at Sea has been a successful part of OCF programming for over 16 years.
 
Courses in Marine Science, Maritime History, Marine Applied Mathematics, Maritime Literature, and Navigation are studied in a thoroughly integrated curriculum taught by a professional academic staff. Topics in each course are arranged to correspond with the voyage itinerary. All studies are linked to the students' immediate experience as sailors and explorers. Students go beyond learning by doing - in Ocean Classroom, they discover the power of learning by living.
 
Ocean Classroom students are full participants in the operation of the ship, learning the time-honored skills of seamanship, and working on watch with the professional ship's officers and crew. In addition to the nautical arts of "hand, reef, and steer", they learn great life-lessons in teamwork, mutual respect, and the value of determined effort. Thus, in a way that is rare in modern life, they come to truly own their achievements and the success of their voyage.

For more information, photographs, student blog, and application materials, please visit www.oceanclassroom.org.

FOR U.S. COLLEGE STUDENTS
SEAmester is a challenging and rewarding college semester at sea. For over thirty years, each spring and fall 21 students are immersed in the traditions of the sea, working with the ship's professional crew to learn the time-honored arts and skills of a seafarer. Students earn 12 college credits in marine science, navigation science, and the humanities from the University of Maine.  All coursework is related to the sea and to the cultures and the natural environments visited throughout the voyage. The campus ranges from coral reefs on the flanks of tropical volcanic islands, to Spanish colonial forts that have held back invaders for 500 years, to North Carolina salt marshes. In SEAmester students have the opportunity to not only study the ocean world, but to live it.

The voyage will sail over 3,000 miles in just over ten weeks, stopping at carefully selected ports of call to correspond with the curriculum on the ship. Ports may include: Bahamas; Dominican Republic; Puerto Rico; Virgin Islands; Antigua; Dominica; Grenadines; Trinidad and Tobago; Cumberland Island, GA; Beaufort, NC; Chesapeake Bay; Mystic, CT; New Bedford, MA; Provincetown, MA.

For more information, photographs, video, and application materials, please visit www.seamester.net.