Here is the article that I wrote about Ocean for Life. I hope it gives just a little snippet of what I did! :)
PRESS RELEASE
Local
Student Participates in NOAA Summer Ocean Program: Ocean for Life
Mei-Jing Bernard, a resident of Atlanta, Georgia, and a home
schooled student, was one of 15 North American students selected from over 400
applicants to participate in the 2013 Ocean for Life program at the National
Oceanic &Atmospheric Administration's Channel Islands National Marine
Sanctuary in June and early July. In addition, 15 other students were chosen by
the GLOBE program in the Greater Middle East from Qatar, Lebanon, Pakistan,
Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Oman.
Ocean for Life is a unique program that brings together
Middle Eastern and North American high school students of diverse cultures and
backgrounds to study marine science, and in the course of that, break down
stereotypes and strengthen global relationships. The premise is simple but powerful: we are
all connected by the ocean, and by studying the ocean, we can learn about
improving stewardship of the planet and ourselves: one world, one ocean. The
following report was submitted by Mei-Jing upon her recent return.
On
my plane ride to California I was incredibly excited to meet all of the new
students both from the US and from the Middle East but I was slightly nervous
about the large cultural differences that I would encounter, not to mention
that there might be a language barrier. However, after bonding with Ayyad from
Lebanon with a conversation about his 34 hour flight to the US and sitting in a
circle after dinner playing ice breaker games, it felt like we were already old
friends. Over the course of the program we taught each other new words and
songs from our languages. Lana and Haneen, both from Qatar, taught a bunch of
the girls how to belly dance during our stay on Santa Cruz island. Later on in
the week I spent a lot of time talking about religion with Ghazi from Saudi Arabia
and Fiona from Chicago. Two weeks may not seem like a very long time to get to
know 29 other people, but by the end of the program I felt like I was part of a
giant, loud, laughing family. Nakoa from Hawai'i taught us that "ohana"
translates as "family," which means that no one gets left behind. We
are now the OFL 2013 Ohana.
The
2013 field study was hosted by the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary and
the University of California-Santa Barbara’s Marine Science Institute. We were able to participate in a large variety
of activities throughout the two-week field study, including snorkeling,
kayaking, hiking, water quality monitoring and oceanography. We also learned
about a range of environmental topics, such as climate change, ocean
acidification, kelp forest ecosystems, and the marine life of the Santa Barbara
Channel as well as the different cultures and backgrounds of our fellow campers.
The
activities we participated in focused on ocean science and exploration, stewardship
activities, cultural exchanges and youth media projects. Our media projects
were mentored by staff from Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ocean Futures Society Media Camp and American University’s Center for Environmental Filmmaking. My
media camp mentor was Tony Azios and the other adult chaperone for my group was
Corinne Jabbour from Lebanon. During media camp we were broken into 4 groups
and each group had one of the four topics: Sense Of Place, Ocean Conservation,
Cultural Understanding, and Interconnectedness. My group's topic was the final
one. Throughout the week we used the cameras that we had been given to document
our field experiences through both still photography and video. I had so much
fun working on the project, and now my group's video, which was posted on
Youtube, has over 1,000 views!
When I first
applied to the OFL program I had to fill out a survey which featured a question
with two circles. One circle was labeled "you" and the other was
labeled "ocean," and you had to pick the picture that showed how
connected you felt with the ocean. I picked the overlapping circles that shared
a bit more than half of their surfaces. I would now choose the circles that almost
line up, one on top of the other, so that virtually everything is shared.
Originally, I thought that my geographic distance from the coast made me less
connected to the ocean. Yes, I knew the point about how every one of your
actions can affect someone else, but I don't think it really clicked until I
got to Ocean for Life. We learned
about how all of the bodies of water that we name separately are really just
part of one giant ocean. We are inextricably linked whether we want to be or
not. We must take responsibility for the mistakes we have made, and take action
right them, so that we can all have the ocean to enjoy for centuries to come.
While at Ocean for Life I got to do some things
that I never would have been able to do in Atlanta, things like snorkeling in a
kelp forest, picking up starfish from the bottom of the ocean that were larger
than a dinner plate, kayaking in the ocean, and making 15 new friends from the
Middle East. I am so grateful to Ocean
for Life and people such as Claire Fackler, our fearless program
leader, all of the media camp mentors, the
additional adult chaperones and, of course, our sponsors who made the program
possible. Ocean for Life will stay
with me for a lifetime.
For
information, http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/education/ofl/
or http://oceanforlife.org.
To view the 2013 Youth Media Projects
created by the students, visit http://oceanforlife.org/page/ofl-projects.
No comments:
Post a Comment