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The WHALE TAIL® Grants Program is funded by sales of the WHALE TAIL® License Plate and donations to the Protect Our Coast and Oceans Tax Check Off. The grants support programs that teach California's children and the general public to value and take action to improve the health of the state's marine and coastal resources. Highlighted below are some examples of recent grant recipients. See a full list on our grants map.
You can support the WHALE TAIL® Grants Program
by purchasing a WHALE TAIL® License Plate or
by donating to the Protect
Our Coast and Oceans Fund on the California state tax form.
YES Nature to Neighborhoods
As part of a WHALE TAIL® Grant-funded project, YES Nature to Neighborhoods' Winter Camp took place this February in the Marin Headlands. Among those attending were eight youth in leadership positions helping with coastal conservation presentations to younger campers. One youth leader alumnus held a formal role as a Trip Leader during the weekend camp. Campers engaged in a wide range of activities from educational presentations to connecting with and kindling a love of the coast while hiking and playing on the beach under the sun. The weekend included healthy physical recreation activities, team-building, and learning about the effects of microplastics and microfibers on our marine and coastal habitats. Even the gorgeous sunny weather in mid-February provided a reference point for discussions of climate change and coastal conservation.
YES Nature to Neighborhoods' WHALE TAIL® Grant is also supporting other programming, including a "Marine Debris
Action Team" at Point Reyes National Seashore. YES strives to cultivate both youth and adult leaders in Richmond and
surrounding West Contra Costa County who lead healthy connected lives; motivate change in their neighborhoods; and
inspire a safe, thriving community.
Salmon River Restoration Council
The WHALE TAIL® Grant-funded "Creeks to Coast: A Watershed Science Program" presented a six-week watershed education and restoration curriculum
and a three-day coast field trip to 6th-8th grade students at five Klamath and Salmon River schools in Siskiyou County.
A collaboration between the Salmon River Restoration Council, the
Mid Klamath Watershed Council, and the Karuk Tribe's
Department of Natural Resources, this project taught students about the connections between their local creeks and
rivers and the Pacific Ocean, as well as the challenges facing these different environments. They learned about ocean
and estuary ecology, human impacts on the environment, and Karuk storytelling. They took part in habitat restoration
and river cleanups, and experienced camping at Patrick's Point State Park with hikes, tidepooling, and whale watching.
They visited Humboldt State University's Marine Lab and the Sumeg Yurok village with the Yurok Tribe.
The Marine Mammal Center
Ocean
Ambassadors is a middle school program letting students read the actual medical files of real patients at
The Marine Mammal Center as part of a year-long study
of marine mammals and ocean health. Through learning about real seals and sea lions (and visiting some in person) that
were affected by human actions, youth become inspired to learn what people can do help protect the ocean environment
and the wildlife that depend on it. This program includes lessons, classroom resources, and teacher training all provided
free of charge by The Marine Mammal Center in the San Francisco Bay Area (and Hawai'i). At the end of the school year,
enthusiastic student representatives come together at a "ConservationCon" to present conservation action projects they
developed.
Real Good Fish
Real Good Fish (a project of the nonprofit Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs) operates the
Bay2Tray program,
which provides local fish to school districts to use in their lunches. But the program also has an educational component
called Fishermen in the Classroom, run in partnership with the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. A WHALE TAIL®
grant funded commercial fishermen and fisherwomen to make 25 presentations at nine elementary schools in Santa Cruz, Monterey,
and San Benito counties. They spoke to the children about their jobs, the ocean, and the value of sustainable seafood.
An educator from the Sanctuary came too and talked about ocean stewardship. The children learned about their adventures
at sea, what their jobs are like, and how to make ocean-friendly food choices.
TOLOWA DUNES STEWARDS
In Del Norte County not too far from the Oregon border, Tolowa Dunes Stewards is using a WHALE TAIL® grant for their project, "Developing Youth,
Tribal and Community Leaders." TDS hosts youth volunteer groups to remove non-native vegetation from Tolowa Dunes
State Park so native dune plants can thrive; they host native plant walks and invasive plant removal events for
the local community; and they collaborate with multiple generations of tribal members of the Tolowa Dee-ni' Nation.
Activities with the tribal members include teaching them how to find and make traditional vine tea from the dune forest,
restoration and education programs for tribal youth, and leading field programs in partnership with the Tolowa Culture
Department. Sometimes these programs even inspire creative writing! And they have also inspired teens to keep coming back and to make their own
video. TDS receives funding through a partnership
with the nonprofit Friends of the Dunes and has recently been able to leverage the WHALE TAIL® funds to receive
much more government grant money to restore more habitat and help native wildlife like the Western snowy plover.
OUTDOOR OUTREACH
Outdoor Outreach offers
adventure-based learning experiences to urban, underserved teens in San Diego County who
normally lack access to outdoor areas. With help from a WHALE TAIL® grant, over 240 youth
were able to take part in environmental education and stewardship programs on the San Diego
County coast. Some of the activities for different groups included: kayaking at the San Diego
Bay National Wildlife Refuge; tidepooling at Cabrillo National Monument; helping clean up trash
at Border Field State Park during Tijuana River Action Month; and learning about watersheds and
how pollutants flow downstream, while also going surfing and learning stand up paddle boarding.
SAN DIEGO AUDUBON SOCIETY
San Diego Audubon Society recently
finished a project supported by a WHALE TAIL® grant combining the creativity of third-graders with
the protection of endangered California Least Terns. The San Diego students participating in "Sharing Our
Shores: Mission Bay" learned about the coastal habitats supporting Least Tern nesting areas, as well as
threats to these shorebirds including habitat loss, pollution, off-leash dogs, and human disturbance to
their nesting areas. Then they designed signs to raise public awareness and reduce interference with the
nesting birds. Winning designs were turned into permanent signs installed at the beach, and all the rest
were displayed at "Love Your Wetlands Day" at Mission Bay. Each class also visited Mariner's Point in
Mission Bay Park for an educational field trip and to help remove invasive species and prepare the site
for the Least Tern nesting season.
GROUNDSWELL COASTAL ECOLOGY
Healthy Coastal Communities is a project of Groundswell Coastal Ecology, bringing together Santa Cruz youth,
adult community volunteers, government agencies, and restoration professionals to foster
coastal stewardship and improve habitat at the seashore. With help from a WHALE TAIL® grant,
500 Santa Cruz area students at Title I elementary schools and high school occupational programs
are participating in Groundswell's five-step ecological restoration curriculum, which includes:
lessons on coastal biodiversity, native seed harvesting and plant propagation, restoration
planting, making scientific illustrations, and monitoring the habitat restoration outcomes.
Native plants are grown at greenhouses right at the schools, and then the students help plant
them at places like Seabright Beach and Natural Bridges State Beach. Hundreds of adults from
the area pitch in at community work days to help out too. The students also make paintings of
the native plant species on small wooden signs and install them by their new plants for everyone to see.
ACTION NETWORK
Action Network in Gualala, California
received a WHALE TAIL® grant for a "Coastal Connections" environmental education program for
children from northern Sonoma and southern Mendocino counties, many of whom were from rural tribal
reservations and low-income housing projects. Action Network provided summer-long programming over
two years, plus monthly activities during the school year, and took the children on educational trips
to the local beach, coastal prairie, and streams where they covered many topics such as coastal geology,
marine debris, native species, and local Pomo culture.
OCEAN CONNECTORS
Ocean Connectors uses environmental education
about migrating marine species to inspire and connect underserved youth in National City (south San Diego
County) with marine science and conservation. In the fourth grade, students study the endangered sea turtles
that live in San Diego Bay while learning about pollution prevention and visiting the Living Coast Discovery
Center in Chula Vista. In the fifth grade, students learn about the migrating California gray whale as well
as topics related to sustainable seafood, and they go on a naturalist-led whale-watching trip. And in the
sixth grade, they study migrating birds and their ecosystems and also learn about the impacts of pollution
and habitat loss. The six-graders' outdoor experience is to help restore habitat, remove litter, and observe
waterfowl in the South San Diego Bay National Wildlife Refuge.
CALIFORNIA EXPOSITION & STATE FAIR
The popular "Whale Tail" exhibit is returning to the California State Fair from July 14-30, 2017. Sponsored by a WHALE TAIL®
grant from the California Coastal Commission, the exhibit features live rescue animals as
well as information about marine debris, ocean acidification, water quality, and sustainable
seafood. The exhibit will be both fun and educational, raising awareness about healthy practices
to reduce negative impacts on waterways and the marine environment. Interactive games include
video games demonstrating the importance of litter removal, and a marine-themed game of Jenga®
featuring giant blocks that illustrate the delicate balancing act of fishing in the ocean.
ALGALITA MARINE RESEARCH AND EDUCATION
The Ship2Shore
program of Algalita Marine Research and Education
educates youth about the health of coastal waters and inspires them to address the problem of plastic
pollution in the ocean. With support from a WHALE TAIL® grant, 116 students from Long Beach and
other nearby cities participated in real-world research to measure the health of East San Pedro Bay by
collecting water and sea floor samples, identifying marine life, and counting and mapping floating plastic
debris. Several thousand more students were also reached through live satellite broadcasts from onboard
the research boat, assemblies back at school, and an interactive blog. Participating teens followed up
their research expeditions with community action projects to reduce plastic waste such as installing a
water station at school so students won't need to use plastic water bottles on campus anymore. One Long
Beach youth even won an honorable mention for a video submitted to C-SPAN urging the US government to address the issue of plastic
pollution.
WILDCOAST and LOS ANGELES WATERKEEPERBoth WILDCOAST and LA Waterkeeper received WHALE TAIL® grants to bring underserved youth to southern California's Marine Protected Areas to explore offshore waters by boat and become citizen scientists. (MPAs are underwater parks protecting the natural resources of that area.) WILDCOAST recruited underserved middle and high school students from groups like San Ysidro Girl Scouts, the La Jolla Band of Luiseño Indians, and schools in urban San Diego and Chula Vista, taught them about marine ecology and the MPAs of San Diego County, and then took them aboard chartered fishing boats they used as "floating labs" so the youth could collect data on water quality, plankton, fish, and human uses.
LA Waterkeeper worked with the Sherman Indian Museum and Sacred Places Institute to bring student
"ambassadors" from Sherman Indian High School in Riverside to take part in the MPA Watch program
monitoring the Marine Protected Areas in LA County for any boating or fishing activities and then
presenting their findings to their classmates. LA Waterkeeper's program also included coastal education
workshops on the school campus and developing a coastal stewardship curriculum incorporating Native
American traditional ecological knowledge and traditional sustainability practices.
VIDA VERDE
"Carrots is the roots!" exclaims an instructor who goes by "Lando" to a group of kids from East Palo
Alto having lunch at Vida Verde Nature Education's
farm. The farm includes a beautiful vegetable patch
that's going to provide them with some of their dinner each night, a yard with chickens who donate their
eggs every morning for breakfast, and goats they get to milk. (They even get to make cheese from the milk.)
As they finish up their food, Lando enthusiastically tells them about recycling, reusing, and composting,
and then each of them takes a turn sorting their lunch trash accordingly. We're visiting because we especially
want to see what comes next—a short bus ride to the San Mateo coast where another instructor who goes
by "Ms. Currant" leads a tidepooling exploration. The students we tag along with will also visit a sandy
beach after that. Vida Verde hosts a different group of kids each week during the fall and spring, they're
all Bay Area students from urban schools who attend for free, they're nearly all children of color, and none
of them would have otherwise been given the opportunity for an overnight outdoor education program. A WHALE
TAIL® grant is helping cover the cost of groups like this to attend the three-day coastal environmental
education program at Vida Verde.
KIDS for the BAY
"When I say Muir, you say Beach!" calls out Cayla Naranjo, a KIDS for the BAY instructor who's getting the attention of around 50 third-graders
who've just arrived at the seashore from their school in Oakland. It's a pretty big deal for them to
be here; I'm told that last week when they visited Crab Cove in Alameda, they were thrilled just to be
able to play soccer on real grass during their break. And they are excited. After they all wave hello
to the ocean, learn about some of the species they might see here, and review safety rules, they get
to take off their shoes and explore the beach. It's low tide, and they focus on the tidepools at the
rocky shore where they see lots of anemones and mussels and some crabs moving around. They sink into
the very wet sand. They shriek. They splash in the waves. They're told to only get wet up to their shins.
That doesn't happen. They shriek some more. "This is the best day ever," says a breathless Ashley,
completely unprompted.
California Exposition & State Fair
The 2016 California State Fair includes an
exhibit called "Whale Tales" which educates visitors about California's coast and ocean, how people can
help preserve these environments, and the animals that live in California's ecosystems. "Whale Tales"
includes a story about a whale that encounters different environmental hazards facing the ocean, interactive
stations for people walking through, and live furred and feathered friends during the Coastal Animal Show.
Visitors can also talk with members of the Sacramento Regional Conservation Corps who have learned all about
topics facing our ocean and our waterways. This exhibit is open from July 8-24, 2016 and is sponsored by a
WHALE TAIL® grant from the California Coastal Commission.
The Marine Mammal Center
The Marine Mammal Center
received a WHALE TAIL® grant for a Climate Change Education Initiative
to teach visitors about the effects of climate change (particularly on marine mammals) and how people
can reduce their own carbon footprints. In-depth trainings for volunteers and staff prepared them to
incorporate climate change education into docent conversations, tours, and programs for thousands of
visitors at The Marine Mammal Center. Funding also supported the production of a short animated video
for all ages created by students at the California College of the Arts. Please watch it
here!
HEAL THE BAY
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Groundwork San Diego - Chollas Creek
developed the Chollas Creek Climate Action Challenge for youth in urban southeastern San Diego
with support from a WHALE TAIL® grant in our new climate change education category. The program
taught students about greenhouse gases, global climate change, ocean acidification, and rising sea
temperatures; the green sea turtles that live in San Diego Bay and how climate change and ocean pollution
affect them; the benefits of urban canopies in absorbing carbon dioxide; and how to reduce energy
consumption at home. After they conducted home energy audits, they unplugged unused electrical devices
that still consume power ("energy vampires!"), calculated the savings, and made presentations to their
families. The students also had the opportunity to grow native plants and visit the
Living Coast Discovery Center in Chula Vista
to observe the sea turtles and other marine life, study water chemistry, and explore the Bay.
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Return of the Natives is the education and outreach program
of the Watershed Institute at Cal State Monterey Bay. RON has received a number of WHALE TAIL® grants over
the years to support teaching students of all ages about native plants and habitat restoration as they collect
and grow seeds and install native plants in sandy dunes near Monterey Bay. Most recently, RON received funding for
working with children and their parents in Salinas to teach them about their personal connection to the local
watershed and how litter in their schoolyards and neighborhoods ends up in the creeks and ultimately in Monterey Bay.
They learned about pollution prevention at school, did field studies and a cleanup at a local creek, and continued
their studies at the beach where the Salinas River ends up. In a special activity, their parents received bilingual
lessons and information about outdoor nature and stewardship activities they can do with their children.
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Family enjoying the Beach Buddy Adventure, Courtesy California State Fair
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Add a splash of fun to your summer and learn more about our ocean by visiting "Beach Buddy Adventure" at the California State Fair from July 10-26, 2015. Enjoy frolicking otters, say hello to a tule elk, and learn about other coastal species and ways our inland behaviors affect creeks, rivers, and their coastal environments. Use a "Beach Buddy" map to earn your official "Beach Buddy Badge" by visiting various stations to explore environmental issues affecting the wildlife of coastal California. Talk with members of the Sacramento Regional Conservation Corps who have learned all about topics facing our ocean and our waterways. There's even a giant sandcastle where you can learn about beach sand and a lighthouse with a bald eagle ready for your visit.
This exhibit won a national award in 2014 is being sponsored again this year by a WHALE TAIL® grant
from the California Coastal Commission.
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Students from June Jordan School for Equity
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Thanks to a WHALE TAIL® grant, students from June Jordan School for Equity, a small public school in San Francisco,
will have the opportunity to explore and investigate the nearby ocean and Bay. A science teacher
at June Jordan wrote and received a grant to buy supplies like microscope attachments and binoculars
and to bring biology students out into their local environment. Field Biology students in 9th and
10th grades were able to visit local wetlands, visit Candlestick Point, collect and classify oceanic
plankton, and do a beach cleanup and learn about human impacts on San Francisco Bay. Marine Biology
students in 12th grade kayaked in Elkhorn Slough to see wildlife up close and took part in a research
cruise with the Marine Science Institute, conducting different marine science activities and finally
getting to experience a boat ride.
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Cabrillo High School Aquarium
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Whatever you're picturing a school aquarium looks like, the one at Cabrillo High School, near Vandenberg Airforce Base, is better than that. There are quite a few tanks, they're clean and beautiful, and the whole room looks very professionally put together. The entire aquarium is largely run by students, who do everything from animal husbandry and maintaining water filtration systems to teaching visiting elementary students from Lompoc (in northern Santa Barbara County) and hosting public open houses. My guides are two head curators, Ashley and Jacob (plus their faculty advisor, Chris Ladwig). Ashley is doing her senior project on creating two new tanks, the shark tank and the saltwater tank, where she's cultivated corals that are growing beautifully. Jacob loves "fun facts" and keeps them up at a steady pace: the flesh of the cabezon fish is green; decorator crabs stick small shells and pebbles onto their backs using their saliva as glue; the lines visible on a blue whale's chest are veins large enough for a human baby to crawl through. They also ask me some questions, like do I know what SCUBA stands for (I do, in fact).
I also see the classroom in the back, where earlier, fourth-graders spent half a day doing hands-on science
activities around a kelp theme that high school students prepared and led for them. The classroom will be
home to two wet lab stations that a Whale Tail® grant will help pay for so the high schoolers can hook
up salt water tanks and conduct their own marine science projects.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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Cabrillo High School Aquarium Classroom
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Mattole Restoration Council staff in Petrolia
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The Mattole Restoration Council works in California's remote "Lost Coast" and is headquartered in Petrolia, a town of around 500 people you can reach if you drive over an hour along winding, potholed, scenic Mattole Road from Ferndale in Humboldt County. If you stop at Petrolia's center and ask at the general store, you'll be directed to the town's only available office space upstairs from the community center. And there you'll find the knowledgeable, energetic MRC staff, who recently gave me a tour of their community and the work they do there.
MRC has a WHALE TAIL® grant for a Youth Environmental Stewards program being implemented through a
partnership of local organizations. Each month during the school year, students (the future landowners of
the area) at the different schools in the region get a classroom visit and a related field trip on a
series of topics on coastal and watershed health. For instance, they learned about salmon populations and
helped with a restoration project creating a cold water slough as a haven for migrating salmon. They
learned about marine debris and then cleaned up trash from Mattole Beach. This winter they'll learn about
nonpoint source pollution, visit local erosion sites, and study its impact on the Mattole Estuary. During
the summer, the WHALE TAIL® grant supported internships for young adults to work on watershed
restoration projects, as well as training for counselors at Lost Coast Camp to lead environmental
stewardship activities for their campers.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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Dr. Wendy Marshall, Director of Education, shows off a fun way to learn about overfishing.
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ExplorOcean's Ocean Literacy Center invites the public to come learn about the seven principles of ocean literacy through fun, educational, hands-on activities. Design and drive an underwater robot. Compete to build the slowest-sinking plankton model. Give a weather report in front of a green screen. See how hard it is to catch fish when we remove too many of them from the sea. Located on the Newport Beach boardwalk at the former Newport Harbor Nautical Museum, ExplorOcean also offers a Maker Lab, a public lecture series, outdoor science activities, and programs for teachers to help educate their students in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math).
A WHALE TAIL® grant from the California Coastal Commission is helping ExplorOcean teach ocean literacy
to several hundred underserved children in the afterschool KidWorks program in Santa Ana. They started with
hands-on lessons in the spring, learning how they are all interconnected with the ocean, and during the summer
they are able to attend camp in Newport Beach for educational activities, a harbor cruise, tide pooling, a
visit to Catalina Island, and more.
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California State Fair Beach Buddy Adventure exhibit entrance
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Add a splash of fun to your summer by visiting "Beach Buddy Adventure" at the California State Fair from July 11-27, 2014. Walk through the mouth of a whale
to enjoy frolicking otters, hang out at the beach house with pelicans, and learn about other coastal
species and ways our inland behaviors affect their environments. Use a "Beach Buddy" map to earn your
official "Beach Buddy Badge" by visiting various stations to explore environmental issues affecting
the wildlife of coastal California. Talk with members of the Sacramento Regional Conservation Corps
who have learned all about topics facing our ocean and our waterways. There's even a giant sandcastle
where you can learn about beach sand and a lighthouse with bald eagles ready for your visit.
This exhibit is sponsored by a WHALE TAIL® grant from the California Coastal Commission.
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Fiona O'Kelly wears "poison oak gloves" to demonstrate plants to avoid.
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Although rain was starting to fall, that didn't deter about three dozen students from Sutro Elementary in San Francisco from hiking down the hill as they arrived at the Clem Miller Environmental Education Center. They were excited to be starting their two-night visit at the Point Reyes National Seashore and they all settled down to hear an orientation from Program Coordinator Fiona O'Kelly (aka "Firefly"), who went over guidelines for their stay. The parts that seemed most crucial (like what to do if a bat gets in your cabin) were translated into Chinese by their teacher, and I learned a few things too—mice will nibble a fallen deer antler to get calcium; poison hemlock has formic acid just like red ants do.
By the time the students, their parents, and their dedicated teachers leave, they will have spent two days
here doing science field studies, capping off many lessons in their classroom beforehand. A WHALE TAIL®
grant to the Point Reyes National Seashore Association
is helping offset the program fees for this school and others like it, so they can afford to come and learn
at the wetlands, beaches, and hills of this beautiful and memorable spot on the California coast.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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MLK Jr. Middle School students enjoying the Marin Headlands.
Photo courtesy of YMCA Pt. Bonita. |
My Home, My Community, My World helps students connect with their local watershed, experience a visit to
the YMCA
Point Bonita, and realize that the ocean is in their own backyard. The YMCA received a WHALE
TAIL® grant to work with students from the disadvantaged community of Marin City. Naturalists visited
their schools—Bayside Elementary and MLK Jr. Middle School—and 4th graders spent a day at a nearby beach
and a day at the Marin Headlands, 7th and 8th graders kayaked on Richardson Bay, and 5th and 6th graders
had the biggest adventure of all. They toughed out a six-mile hike (with gear!) straight from their
neighborhood, over the ridge behind them (where many had never ventured), and down through the Golden Gate
National Recreation Area until they arrived at the ocean for a three-day outdoor education program at the
YMCA. Throughout these experiences, all students were learning about the bay, the ocean, coastal
ecosystems, and the importance of taking care of their surrounding environment.
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Anna Cummins and Marcus Erikson, 5 Gyres Co-Founders
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Faces formed from melted plastic; a cast of a pregnant woman's body; large jumbled fishing nets—this is not your typical art exhibit or your typical educational content. But this creative collection has been put on display by 5 Gyres, which received a WHALE TAIL® grant for a traveling exhibit about the impacts of pollution in the world's oceans. The faces tell the story of plastic pollution through images of people who have contributed to the field of research on this issue; the pregnant body formed from ocean plastics illustrates the impacts of plastic chemicals on our bodies and unborn children; and the jumbled fishing nets remind us that they keep killing wildlife when they're left floating in the ocean. These pieces are part of "Saving Our Synthetic Seas," on exhibit at the Seed Gallery in San Francisco's Presidio until 11/8/13.
The grant for 5 Gyres is supporting other projects too, including developing a "plastic pollution report card"
for different California beaches (based on the amount of plastics found in the sand), assembly programs in
schools, encouraging some of those schools to become "waste free," and a student art contest. For more
information and a short video of the exhibit, please visit 5gyres.org/education_and_exhibits.
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Save Our Shores Beachkeeper. Photo courtesy of Save Our Shores.
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Beachkeepers ♥ clean beaches! On World Oceans Day in 2013, Save Our Shores launched the Beachkeepers program in Santa Cruz County with support
from a WHALE TAIL® grant.
Save Our Shores staff had been hearing from local residents that they wanted to conduct regular beach cleanups
independently (beyond the Adopt-A-Beach events Save Our Shores already organizes), and that they were especially
interested in taking care of "their" beach that they visit most often. Harnessing this interest and creating a
network of like-minded beach lovers, the Beachkeepers program trains motivated volunteers to hold their own beach
cleanups, gives them supplies and a uniform, and provides a forum for them to share information about their activities.
They can post to the Beachkeepers Facebook
page, blog on the Beachkeepers webpage, post data on
what they collected, share photos, chat with one another, and inspire others to join the network.
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Squid eyeballs!
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At Stanford University, Professor William Gilly's lab not only researches the giant Humboldt squid, they ship frozen specimens of these fascinating creatures all over the country so teachers can dissect them for their students. With a goal of increasing scientific literacy and excitement for marine biology, lab members also lead squid dissections at special venues like museums and science festivals. This outreach program is a collaboration between Stanford's Hopkins Marine Station and NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service. The squid are donated by sport fisherman or collected in conjunction with ongoing research.
A WHALE TAIL® grant helped pay for the Squids-4-Kids program to send these frozen giants to California schools. But it was a slow year, with El Niño causing fewer squid to be found than usual, so the grant also supported staff time improving the program's educational website. There, teachers can find a step-by-step dissection guide and a sample lesson plan, and anyone can take a look at some videos, more information about squid, and some very detailed (and very slimy!) labeled photographs.
(Professor Gilly has also written eloquently about the power of curiosity and exploration in fostering a
child's love for the natural world, and he has kindly allowed us to share his thoughts here.)
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Photo courtesy of the Los Angeles Conservation Corps
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There's much more to the Los Angeles Conservation Corps' Sea Lab in Redondo Beach than you might think at first. At first, you might think it's a nice little aquarium with a big classroom in the back, and you'd be right. Indeed, there are tanks with different types of sea life in it, and you can walk around and look at them and learn about them, and they're pretty neat, including some giant clams and a tropical tank of corals that it turns out are acquired when they're seized by customs agents (!). But if you get to tour the facilities behind the building, you'll see much more going on. There are touch tanks (I learn shark skin feels like sandpaper), a tank of seriously large bass (rescued, like other fish here, from the once-through cooling systems of power plants), flounders that look just like a floor of sand until you start spotting their eyeballs, a whole project growing green abalone (they're beautiful), a lab run by Algalita Marine Research Foundation studying plastic samples from the oceans, a native plant nursery for coastal habitat restoration projects, and a separate building dedicated to teaching students about water resources.
I'm here because the Sea Lab has a WHALE TAIL® grant to support
the Key to the Sea program, which teaches elementary students about watersheds, the storm drain system,
pollution prevention, sandy beach habitat, and environmental stewardship. Young adult Corpsmembers not
only host hundreds of school children on their educational field trips, they're also recruiting their
former elementary schools to participate and they're learning how to lead workshops educating teachers
about ocean life and marine conservation. As with the other programs here, the Corpsmembers work toward
getting a high school diploma while they also work on environmental improvement projects and learn
aquarium-related skills that help them find jobs later on.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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Youth Community Service's Shannon Smoot, speaking to Menlo-Atherton High School students
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The room full of teens at Menlo-Atherton High School and I don't start talking about watersheds right away. First, led by their somewhat-older-but-just-as-hip leader, Shannon Smoot, we go over ground rules; some ("Respect!") are more self-explanatory than others ("Don't Yuck My Yum!"). Then we do a few icebreakers, like arranging ourselves by birthdate without speaking or writing. Then we identify our personality type by color and discuss how that influences our leadership style and interactions with others. (The most common label in the room is "orange"—spontaneous, daring; my "gold" label is much more mundane—dependable, caring.) But finally we're treated to a presentation about watersheds from guest speaker Seth Chanin, Restoration Project Manager at Save the Bay. Some of the youth have already learned about watersheds during the summer, while others joined the group this fall and need to catch up. They talk about a range of topics including San Francisco Bay, the Golden Gate, estuaries, wetlands, pollution prevention, and how 4 out of 10 raindrops in California end up flowing into SF Bay and out to the Pacific Ocean. Lastly, we view the first draft of a video they're producing about their summer service learning projects at different points along their local watershed—San Francisquito Creek, East Palo Alto marshlands, and Half Moon Bay State Beach.
This after-school life skills class is made up of teens from East Palo Alto and Menlo
Park, outside the school's immediate neighborhood. Once the video is done, they will
present it to elementary students in the underserved Ravenswood City School District of
East Palo Alto to teach the younger kids about watershed protection. A WHALE TAIL® grant to Youth Community Service is helping make this project possible.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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Students use an underwater "Fish Cam" to view sea life in the kelp beds.
Photo courtesy Crystal Cove Alliance
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Helping meet the Crystal Cove Alliance's goal to "preserve the past, enjoy the present, and educate for the future" is a program series called "SNAP!—Science and Nature at the Park." Serving students and the general public, SNAP! includes a wide variety of programs at Crystal Cove State Park in Orange County including public exhibits and lectures, "Scientist in the Park" open houses, Marine Protected Area research cruises, classes on the beach for students with disabilities, and science instruction in a laboratory and on the water.
To help support SNAP!, a WHALE TAIL® grant funded a pilot program
for Marine Protected Area citizen science cruises. Over 200 students went on seven offshore boat trips
and used microscopes to count fish eggs and plankton larvae they collected; used fishing rods specially
equipped with a camera and a monitor to view and document the different types of fish living in the kelp
forest under their boat; and collected water samples to measure temperature, pH, and salinity. The
grant also supported 120 high school students attending an ocean acidification lab. Besides covering
costs for these students, funding was also used for purchasing digital microscopes, underwater cameras,
and other equipment to use in future citizen science cruises. Finally, funds supported the design of
interpretive panels educating the public about whales and other marine mammals.
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Low tide at San Francisco's Pier 94, with Golden Gate Audubon
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"Pretend you're a bird flying in the air," Anthony DeCicco, Education Director for Golden Gate Audubon is saying as I arrive. "You're flying and you see this green patch. What is it?"
"California!" comes one hopeful guess.
"It's Pier..." cues DeCicco.
"94!" comes the answer.
The green patch on the map he's holding is indeed Pier 94, and I'm there on a sparkling spring day after
navigating past a whole slew of noisy trucks in an industrial area in southeast San Francisco. He's sitting
with a group of maybe 18 third-graders from nearby Flynn Elementary, and they're overlooking a wetland at
low tide near the bottom of Islais Creek that used to be a dumping ground before Golden Gate Audubon began
restoring it. After they listen to this history, learn about how the pollution harmed wildlife in San Francisco
Bay and the Pacific Ocean, and get an overview of local wildlife and what they're going to do today, they break
up into three groups. I go with the group that will be peeking under rocks where the tide has gone out. The
assignment is to look for crabs and isopods, determine the gender and appearance of the crabs, and use a key
to identify them. A boy named Jermaine is definitely not excited about this, but in less than five minutes he
is jumping and whooping and yelling, "We found a big one! We found a big one!" (His schoolmate Jamal, who
is also definitely not excited about this, will end up proudly showing me what he collected too.)
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Golden Gate Audubon's Anthony DeCicco
with Flynn Elementary students |
Emma needs a partner, so I get to be her partner. Emma is wearing a pink baseball camp and she is excited about this activity. She loves handling the crabs and picking up the crawly isopods (think really big pill bugs with lots of legs moving very fast), which is my ideal kind of partner. I handle the collecting tray.
Other groups are exploring the wetland, removing litter, and using a spotting scope and binoculars to conduct a bird census. There are Canada geese, a curlew, and an osprey with a nest on top of a large industrial crane. We see a goose family with fluffy babies float by.
I have to leave at lunchtime, but one of the last things I do is taste a salt marsh plant called pickleweed for
the first time. It tastes like salty grass—nothing like a pickle. Later on, students will be rotating activities
and installing some native plants to help improve the habitat. Before the school year is out, they will also
visit the upper end of the Islais Creek watershed (at Glen Canyon Park) and take their families to Muir Beach
to explore the ocean. It's all part of the Eco-San Francisco environmental education program funded in part by a Whale
Tail® grant.
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Sylvie Lee Grants Program Coordinator |
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A front yard is transformed by the Ocean Friendly Gardens Program
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The Surfrider Foundation's Ocean Friendly Gardens Program helps people apply CPR to their garden—Conservation, Permeability and Retention—to revive their watersheds and oceans. These environmentally friendly gardening techniques use less water, eliminate the use of chemicals, prevent or at least cleanse runoff, and create wildlife habitat. A Whale Tail® grant is supporting two Ocean Friendly Garden (OFG) education and training series—one in Santa Barbara County and one in Ventura County. Each series consists of five sessions: a Watershed Basics Class covering the fundamentals of CPR; a Hands-On Workshop in a highly visible garden to evaluate it for CPR and develop design ideas; a Garden Assistance Party to turn the garden into an OFG and post an OFG yard sign; returning to walk the neighborhood to identify gardens that could become ocean-friendly with a little help, or ones that are already eligible for a sign; and a special workshop for landscaping professionals.
The program keeps going even after the four workshops, because any recipient of a new garden agrees to serve as a model for the neighborhood and to "pay it forward" and help with creating another OFG in the future.
The series in both counties are underway this spring. To participate or to get more information, please contact Surfrider's
Ventura County Chapter or the Santa Barbara Chapter.
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Before
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During
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Catching Rain
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Sampling Pacific Mole Crabs at Fort Funston, San Francisco
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On an unusually warm September day in San Francisco, teens from Thornton Continuation High School in Daly City descended on the beach at Fort Funston, planted rows of orange flags near the surf line, and began scooping up sand at each flag. They would then run up the beach to their classmates, rinse the sand away, and see what they were left holding. Quite often they were left holding small Pacific mole crabs. Having done this before, the teens knew how to measure them and determine whether they were male or female, and after marking down the relevant data, they would return the crabs to their sandy home and scoop up the next sample.
These students were participating in the LiMPETS program overseen by the Farallones Marine Sanctuary Association. "LiMPETS" is short for "Long-term Monitoring
Program and Experiential Training for Students." It is a hands-on science education program for middle
and high school students, who monitor either the distribution and abundance of the Pacific mole crab (an
important food web link on sandy beaches), or the distribution and abundance of 33 invertebrate and algae
species at specific rocky intertidal sites along the coast. After the data collection is complete, students
enter their information into the LiMPETS database, which is used by students as well as researchers to
track the populations of key indicator species over time. A Whale Tail®
grant is helping 1,500 Bay Area youth participate in this program.
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Tuolumne Salmon Fry Release
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The Tuolumne River Trust operates the "Trekking the Tuolumne River" program which teaches elementary students in the Central Valley about the Tuolumne River, its value to the community, and how to be good stewards of the river. The program includes classroom activities, help in developing service learning projects, and hands-on activities at outdoor classrooms at the river to learn about watersheds, water quality, the riparian ecosystem, and the salmon lifecycle.
A grant from the Coastal Commission supported the addition of a coastal component to provide students with a more thorough understanding of the Tuolumne's connection to other rivers and the ocean. Students followed the journey of the salmon as they learned to trace the river on a map to the Delta and the Pacific Ocean, learned how river conditions effect conditions downstream, visited salmon spawning grounds during the fall migration, hatched salmonids in their classroom, released the salmon fry into the river, played games mimicking how salmon find their way back to the same river where they hatched, and traveled to the ocean to visit The Marine Mammal Center and Rodeo Beach in the San Francisco Bay Area.
This new coastal component was initially added at Salida Elementary School in Stanislaus County. It is a Title
I magnet school for science, math, and technology, where two-thirds of the students come from underserved
backgrounds. Their teachers received training so they could continue the program on their own. The Trust
intends to expand this new component into other schools in the future.
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Fresno students at the Kids' Ocean Day Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup in Monterey
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What do kids do when they step onto a beach for the first time? Some look toward the horizon, others watch the moving waves, quite a few marvel at how unusual it feels to walk on sand, and just about all of them enjoy it. Fresno Chaffee Zoo has been bringing Central Valley schoolchildren to the shores of Monterey since 2001, and for some of them, the trip is their first opportunity to visit the California coast. The Zoo's Education Department is able to do this through Whale Tail® funding for the Kids' Ocean Day Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup Program. Zoo staff visit participating schools in the spring, teaching students about marine life and the ocean environment and how their actions impact the health of the ocean, even many miles away. Then in the second part of the program, the students ride buses over 150 miles to do something about the pollution problem they've learned about.
In May of 2011, 185 fifth-graders from Carver and Yokomi Elementary Schools in Fresno picked up 4,600 pieces of litter
at Monterey Municipal Beach, which at first glance looked clean to begin with. What do some of them like best about
seeing the ocean for the first time? "Its beauty," said one student. "Being next to it," said another. Besides conducing
a beach cleanup, they also got time to play ball, dig for crabs, and find other ways to enjoy the sand and the water.
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Oakland High School Sea Lion Bowl team members,
courtesy of Katie Noonan |
What are the two most common ions in seawater? What does SCUBA stand for? What are zooxanthellae? San Francisco State University's Romberg Tiburon Center for Environmental Studies helps host the "Sea Lion Bowl" in northern California. Part of the National Ocean Sciences Bowl, this is a challenging quiz-style high school science competition with regional events and national finals.
A Whale Tail® grant from the Coastal Commission is helping support the Sea Lion Bowl's Diversity Initiative, which recruits Bay Area public high schools that are classified as low-income or have significant populations of students of color. Once a school is accepted to participate, it will select up to 25 students to take part in tutoring and mentoring in the ocean sciences, field trips to marine science research or education facilities, practice sessions with other schools, extended-learning college classes in marine science, and an introduction to careers in the ocean sciences. Their teachers receive educational resources and professional development opportunities. At the end of the program, the students conduct team research projects and compete against other regional teams.
In 2011, two teams in the Diversity Initiative competed in the Sea Lion Bowl: San Lorenzo High School and Oakland
High School. Congratulations to both teams, including Oakland High, which won the 4th-place trophy.
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Superpowers! exhibit at
Ty Warner Sea Center |
The Ty Warner Sea Center in Santa Barbara is currently showing a one-year exhibit called Superpowers! It highlights local "superpowered" marine life of the Santa Barbara Channel, the "villains" that threaten them, and the ability of people to become "heroes" for the ocean through everyday actions
The exhibit is written in English and Spanish and starts with a superhero dress-up station where visitors can put on capes as they travel through the different stations. It is then divided into three areas:
The Sea Center is operated by the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. More information on this exhibit can
be found at www.sbnature.org/exhibitions/730.html.
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Camp S.E.A. Lab Girls Surfing Lesson
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Camp SEA Lab ("Science, Education, and Adventure") offers hands-on marine education programs around Monterey Bay aimed at fostering life-long excitement, scientific understanding, and a sense of stewardship for coasts and oceans. Programs include summer day camps, summer residential camps, an outdoor school, training for teachers, and workshops for families. Camp SEA Lab is affiliated with CSU Monterey Bay. Scholarships are offered to include youth from backgrounds traditionally underrepresented in the sciences.
Camp SEA Lab's programs include a wide range of fun and educational activities such as: tide pooling, kayaking, learning to
surf, learning to sail, snorkeling, researching marine animals, visiting the Seymour Center Aquarium, meeting with scientists
at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), learning about ocean science careers, building Remotely Operated
Vehicles (ROVs), examining plankton, dissecting fish, and learning about protecting the ecosystem of Monterey Bay.
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Arcata Elementary School's North Pacific Gyre Art Installation
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In June 2010, the Arcata Community Recycling Center completed an art installation at Arcata Elementary School depicting plastic debris caught in the North Pacific Gyre. The school collected empty plastic bottles and arranged them on the playing field in a giant spiral, symbolizing plastic pieces swirling in the Pacific Ocean. Students also made sea animals which were shown entangled in the plastic debris. The installation was photographed from atop the ladder of an Arcata Fire Department truck. View a video of the project here.
A Whale Tail Grant funded this art project along with the accompanying education program, which included the bottle drive,
in-school lessons about the ocean and marine debris, beach cleanups, touring the Recycling Center, and recycling the bottles
afterward. The project was documented on video
by other students at Sunny Brae Middle School.
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The Cesar Chavez Club organized a 'friends group' for
47th Street Canyon in City Heights |
The non-profit San Diego Canyonlands was awarded a Whale Tail® grant in 2009 to organize residents in underserved urban areas into "friends groups" to revitalize nearby, neglected canyon open spaces and restore the native habitats. They found a lot of energy from the youth groups in City Heights including the Hoover High School Eco-Club and the Cesar Chavez Club. The Cesar Chavez Club is taking on a leadership role in the campaign to restore open space canyons with creeks draining to the coast in the urban community of City Heights, San Diego.
Eight Club members helped with grassroots community outreach to establish a new canyon "friends group" at 47th Street Canyon in City Heights. On a Saturday morning in June they helped distribute flyers to promote a free guided tour in 47th Street Canyon. The students also distributed information encouraging people not to use non-native plants that take over natural habitats in the canyons and information on reducing the use of polluting chemicals and fertilizers in home gardens. The tour was held on June 27th and was a smashing success with 40 attendees. A new stewardship group for the canyon was established with strong and dedicated leadership. They now have routine monthly stewardship events in the canyon. The Cesar Chavez Club has continued to support the canyon group efforts.
Cesar Chavez said, "The only way I know how to organize people is to talk to one person, then talk to
another person, then talk to another person." The flyers the Chavez club distributed brought the community
together to talk about their neighborhood canyon, learn about the importance of the unique habitats in it, and
now they collectively are transforming this open space into healthy habitat that is a safe, enjoyable community asset.
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Student decorating reusable bags with the
Pacific Marine Mammal Center |
With help from a WHALE TAIL® Grant and other donors, the
Pacific Marine Mammal Center launched the
Pinniped Pollution Project in October of 2008. This program has trained and motivated over one
thousand elementary school children to change their polluting behaviors and become stewards of
the marine environment. After modeling how trash travels from their playgrounds and streets
into the ocean and seeing the results of this debris on the marine inhabitants, kids make the
connection between the animals that they find so compelling and their behavior at home. Compelled
to change, the work of giving them alternatives begins. Students are introduced to biodegradable
products and participate in a shopping game that highlights the differences in trash production
and packaging choices. They then summarize their lessons on a cloth bag that they take home with
them. This becomes their new alternative to using throw-away bags as well as a teaching tool that
they use to share what they have learned with others. "I taught my mom what I learned about making
sure that trash does not get in the ocean," says Kayla, a 5th grader from Roosevelt Elementary.
"We thought we were coming to learn about what we could do to save the seals, when in fact we learned
how to save ourselves and the world," says Shirley MacLean, a 4th grade teacher from Jackson Elementary school.
