Programs Blog

This crew of students, currently studying for six weeks on campus here in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, is learning and preparing for our voyage aboard the Robert C. Seamans, one of  two SEA oceanographic sailing ships. Our group is also known as “S-318,” which is the number for this voyage. (SEA’s first voyage, W-1 aboard the ship Westward, was in 1971.) 

We will be sailing from Fiji to Aotearoa New Zealand, with a stop or two along the way, including, if weather permits, a visit to Tuvalu, one of the island nations that is on the very front lines of sea level rise. This “Oceans and Climate” program focuses on understanding the climate crisis and the essential role of the ocean in all of Earth’s life from an interdisciplinary, oceanic point of view. We use the southwestern Pacific as a case study.

My name is Richard King. I teach “Environmental Communication,” one of their five courses within this “Oceans and Climate” program. This blog is part of our coursework. I’m writing this first brief entry just to kick things off, but the majority of the entries, on shore and at sea will be written by the students. The other classes include “Nautical Science,” taught by Captain Rick Miller; “Marine Environmental History,” taught by Dr. Brooke Grasberger; and two oceanography classes taught by Dr. Jan Witting while in Woods Hole and Dr. Claudia Mazur out at sea: “Oceans in the Global Carbon Cycle,” which lays the academic groundwork (bathymetry?) for our research out at sea and “Directed/Practical Oceanographic Research” in which students design then conduct original studies during our voyage. Our student group is also supported in Woods Hole and aboard ship by Program Assistant Talia Felcher, an SEA alumna and recent graduate of Scripps College.

The student crew of the voyage includes sixteen students from all over the country. They are in alphabetical order: 

Quinn Bausch, Grinnell College

Jeff Becko, Columbia University

Kelsie Bottari, Syracuse University

Madeleine Chapman, Kenyon College

Tim Chiu, Carleton College

Hatuey Connelly Molina, University of Puerto Rico, Humacao

Raquel Cuatrecasas, University of San Diego

Isabella Hackermann, Macalester College

Emma Johnson, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Kiera Rennick, Grinnell College

Mira Peffley, Knox College

Willow Shoemaker, Denison University

Anika Stanwiens, University of San Diego

Avery St. Clair, University of Hawaii, Hilo

Sophia Weinstock, Hawaii Pacific University

Arthur Winslow, St. Olaf College

Our first week of classes and first weekend have been a whirlwind of orientation, tours of our small campus, and of Woods Hole proper, including a visit to the Rachel Carson statue and a tour of the library and special collections of the Marine Biological Laboratory and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. With Captain Miller we visited the pool at Massachusetts Maritime Academy to practice getting in and out of survival suits and inflating and using a life raft. Our academic courses have begun in earnest. Woods Hole has been absolutely gorgeous, so students have taken advantage of our  bike fleet or gone on a stroll. Our little campus is on a southern peninsula of Cape Cod. About one mile to the northwest is the sandy and rocky coast of Buzzard’s Bay and one mile to the southeast is the beach of Falmouth and Vineyard Sound. The water is warm on both sides. The trees are still bright green, with little hint of the coming autumn, but every once and a while a breeze comes through that suggests the cooler weather to come.

I’ve taught at SEA for many years now, yet quite genuinely every student group and every voyage are extraordinarily different, with unexpected opportunities and perspectives and new things to learn and explore. I’m excited about this semester and hope you’ll keep checking in to read this blog to keep track of the adventure and how all of us are processing what we’re seeing and learning. With this blog we will compile a unique record of our semester and hopefully share a bit of what we’re learning along the way.  Many of the following blog entries will also be revised for an issue of SEA Writer, which we will publish soon after the semester.

One last note about the “Oceans and Climate” S-318 blog: because of the nature of busy schedules at sea and office schedules here in Woods Hole, you might not see entries for a few days, and then you might see a couple entries posted all at once. The blog is no reflection on the safety of the ship or the status of our daily communications with the Robert C. Seamans for the purpose of logistics and student health. In other words, if you don’t see blog entries posted for a while, it’s no reflection on everybody’s safety. There are also two other SEA programs happening this fall, who will also be blogging. Caribbean Reef Conservation in the Caribbean, and a high school group from Proctor Academy, who will be sailing aboard the Corwith Cramer after a few weeks here in Woods Hole. Students will be able to see comments to the blog while we’re in Woods Hole, but not while we’re at sea. 

Thank you so much for reading!

Rick