MERI Teen Researchers Contribute to the Census on Marine Life

Along with more than 2,000 scientists over 80 nations, a group of enthusiastic high school students is helping MERI’s Education Department to play a role in providing research for a database started by the Census of Marine Life project. This was a ten-year international effort to study marine life in the global ocean by assessing its diversity, distribution and abundance. In the end the Census will lay the foundation for directing future research and science-based policy.

MERI participates in this massive project through Natural Geography In-Shore Areas (NaGISA) a biodiversity study of the world's coastline by taking inventory and monitoring the marine life in the narrow inshore zone of the world's oceans at depths of less than 20 meters, the area people know best and impact most. Nagisa is a Japanese word referring to the narrow coastal zone. NaGISA uses simple cost-efficient and deliberately low-tech sampling protocols to encourage local community involvement.

For the past two years Education Director Martha Bell has designed MERI’s Junior Intern program around the research protocols for NaGISA using Blue Hill Falls as the research sampling area. This year fifteen high school students from Maine, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York State, Montreal, DC, and as far away as California spent two weeks in this summer science program.

The culminating experience was in in Boston on October 1st when participants presented their findings at the Teen Ocean Summit, hosted by the New England Aquarium, in partnership with the New England Ocean Science Education Collaborative (NEOSEC). MERI is proud to be the only Maine institution selected to send up to ten of this year’s Junior Intern class to attend this event and spend the day creatively addressing the challenges surrounding marine environmental issues.

Thank you to all our Junior Interns who contributed valuable research and for whom we hope this experience has inspired an exciting career in marine science.

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