Hi everyone, it’s Liah again.  It has been quite busy at The Island School lately.  With the Research Symposium coming up, we have been working very hard on our scientific posters. All of the groups have done an amazing job thus far and the Research Symposium is where we can finally show off all of our hard work to scientists of many fields, and civilians.  Speaking of research class, the Deep Water Shark and Shark Physiology caught a Big Eyed 6 gill the other day. Very few people will ever be able to say that they were able to see one of these deep sea dwellers, congratulations to them!

Yesterday, we had the opportunity of going on a traditional Sunday free dive; I eagerly took up this opportunity.  Maxey first took us to the coral head accurately named Cathedral for its church-like shapes and qualities, along with its immense beauty. Maxey is always fond of going to “church” on Sunday. On this specific day there was a school of jack inhabiting this reef.  It was a phenomenal site to go down and have the large fish swarm around me; it was like something out of a National Geographic movie.  After leaving this site we swam over to the wall, the wall is where the Exuma Sound drops of to thousands of feet.  We only free dove the 65 foot side but we could peek over into the immense blue depths of the Exuma Sound.  While we were free diving we saw the silhouettes of two Caribbean Reef sharks in the distance, it was amazing to be able to see something that 3 and a half months ago would have terrified me.  Now seeing a shark is a wonder.  As I took I immersed myself for my last free dive of the day I started to relate free diving to our semester here.  You start off unsure, nervous, you start to go deeper into the semester and you want to stay down forever.  You see and experience amazing things but you know you have to go up, no matter how much you want, how much you feel like you need to stay down-you’re running out of breath, out of time. As I returned to the surface and looked towards the sunrise reflecting off of the water.  The red sky shown bright against the aqua water.  I look around, looking at the community, all my friends, this is a place like no other. This is home.

by Clem Titsworth

We awoke to pitter patter of rain splashing on our roofs and filling our cisterns. At precisely 6:19 AM the boys dorm all rolled out of bed and performed their zombie like preparations for morning exercise. We scurried out the front door to circle just in time to avoid push ups before morning exercise. Circle begun, the national anthem was sang, and caciques announced that for morning exercise we got to play capture the flag. Girls and boys south vs norths. South side arranged organized attacks on North’s flag allowing us to emerge victorious. The game ended at 7:30 and students went off to do chores.

We began the academic day with Human Ecology class where we were given time to work on our change bomb project. My team consists of five boys who used the day burning wood in out bio char unit, sanding our sand and glass aggregate tables, designing forms to set the tables on. After Human Ecology, lunch began and various research teams used lunch time to go into the field. My research group, the Lionfish group went out of the Cobia, dive boat, to catch Graysby for our experiments. To do this we did two dives and fished under water. My partner Matt and I were able to catch a few graysby despite only being able to communicate under water using hand signals. As we rose to the surface with three graysby, Matt and I laughed and told each other what we had been trying to say while underwater. Being our last field day our research advisor, Joslyn, made us brownies for the ride back.

Later all students boarded a school bus and enjoyed a loud and long bus ride to the Eleuthera Arts and Cultural Center where we looked at pictures taken during a National Geographic Photo Camp that Island School hosted last spring. The photo camp was meant to expose Bahamian kids to positive hobbies so they would stay away from drugs and other destructive behaviors. The pictures that the kids took were really impressive. Then, the long loud bus ride was then repeated all the way back to The Island School.

By Krissy Trusdale:

Here at The Island School the past few mornings have been devoted to wrapping up our Human Ecology projects, or “change bombs”. This is an exciting time as all of our hard work is coming to a close, whether the project is complete or not. There is a sense of urgency to finish the last cookbook pages or plant the last herbs in the medicinal garden and students are maximizing every moment in and outside of class. The projects have been so diverse this term that everyone has had a unique chance to develop a wide array of skills, especially when dealing failures along the way.

Yesterday afternoon we had CO class, Community Outreach, in which we finished yet another project with each grade of the Deep Creek Middle School students. My seventh grade buddy, Charleston, and I had our last bus ride to Wemyss Bight to plant our community garden. We put the final cuttings of cassava in the sandy ground, and topped it all off with a final layer of home grown soil from our farm on campus. We spread fistfuls of soft mud all around the bases of our cherry bushes and struggling pineapples. It was a scorcher, as per usual on CO day, so the hose watered thirsty plants while misting a few middle schoolers and their older buddies.

The general atmosphere is one of excitement to go out and enjoy our dwindling days with friends and adventures while also a bustle to wrap up all loose ends here on campus. I’m having mixed feelings of wanting go home to my family, but also not wanting to leave home here on Eleuthera. I know I’m not alone. As all of our hard work culminates before our eyes, we are proud of all we’ve learned and how far with we’ve come, but taste of success is bittersweet.

Hi, my name is Liah. I’m excited to say that I’ll be writing some of the upcoming blogs.  The past few days have been very eventful.  Parent’s Weekend was wonderful! We loved seeing all of you and showing you around this amazing place that we have called home for the last 2.5 months.  During Parent’s Weekend we presented our Research projects.  Every group did phenomenal and all of the researchers at CEI said that these were the best presentations yet.  I am so proud of everyone!  Over the weekend we did many exciting things, whether it was free diving at Harbor rock with parents or taking families on their first ever scuba dives.  It was a very busy weekend full of laughs, cries, hugs, and sunburns. It was great to meet everyone’s family and learn where all these incredible people got it from. The coffee house was a very…unusual…production, there was Boy’s dorm belly drumming (shout out to Liam for that solo), evolution of dance with Liz, and a throwback to the 90’s with a Backstreet Boys song and dance. It was hilarious!

I hope everyone enjoyed the Art Show demonstrating our talented kids.  My favorite part of Parent’s Weekend was seeing everyone reuniting with their families.  Running down and chasing after cars or jumping into them, cough, cough Sam, haha. Seeing everyone’s happy faces was amazing.  I am so glad that parents could see this amazing place; there is no where else like The Island School.  Here is a big thank you to all the parent’s for giving your children this experience, it is a once and a lifetime experience like no other.  (Thanks Mom!) Though Parent’s Weekend is over the excitement here at the Island School has not.

Sunday we had a leadership workshop.  There were different classes for different kinds of leadership roles or things you need to learn having to do with leadership.  All of us chose 3 to go to.  I went to “Leading through Happiness”, the “Spontaneous Leadership”, and the “Communication”.  During the happiness seminar we learned of how happiness spreads, if you have a good attitude or do something kind other people will do the same.  We practiced this by giving thank you notes to anyone we felt deserved it.  It is true how the happiness spread, after I received one I wrote one to another person.

The Spontaneous Leadership workshop taught us that we can be leaders without it being predetermined.  The Communication seminar was very interesting.  We were asked questions on how we communicate and were to put ourselves in a quadrant of a Null’s grid.  We learned how each style communicates and leads.  We also learned how to communicate with each style and help lead.  This is very beneficial knowledge to have.

After the workshops we had the afternoon to relax and reflect on the craziness that was Parent’s Weekend.  For this the all the girls went to the sandbar and the boys went to the cut and played water polo.  I don’t know how the boy’s day went, but the girl’s was awesome.  Haeyon taught us Karate moves and Brady showed us how to stand on our heads.  As the day was coming to a close we all jumped on the roof of the Cobia to watch the sunset.  All the girls, all best friends, watching the Bahamian sun set over the aqua marine water is a memory I will cherish forever.  From the sandbar we could see the Island School very well.  The sunset behind the school, behind our home, got a few of us, myself included, a little choked up.  This place is like no other.  The experiences we have, the amazing community we have built, it is one of a kind.  It is very sad to think of the time we have left.  Where else can you watch a sunrise as you are swimming 2 miles for exercise, find the ideal asythmuth angle and area to put solar panels for math, or survey a reef for Marine Ecology.  This place will stay in our hearts forever.  We have learned so much and we will definitely apply that new knowledge when we go back.

by Dale Lattanzio

It is clear that with the coming of Parents Weekend students and faculty are extremely excited to welcome all the families to a very full weekend. Students continue to talk about parents and siblings who are coming to share a few days together here at The Island School. For our Saturday evening activity this week we went to a man named Giant’s house. He is the general contractor who works with the school has been a part of The Island School from the beginning. He loves interacting with all the students that move through the community. He kindly hosted us for a delicious dinner of mac ‘n’ cheese, rice, beets, and chicken with some delicious cake for desert. Despite the fabulous meal the highlight of the evening was the dancing that took part on the deck, it was a fantastic display of students’ rake and scrape dance abilities. On Sunday a group of students embarked on one of our structured free dives. This week’s trip was to the offshore wall where depths begin around eighty feet and then drop off to the floor of the Exuma Sound thousands of feet deep. The Wall is known for its congregation of large fish species both reef and pelagic and everyone was extremely excited to witness its awe. As we swam over to the wall immediately students were perplexed and excited by the nurse shark and large black grouper sitting under an overhang on the shelf. However the excitement really skyrocketed when a six to seven foot Caribbean reef shark came up from the depths. After safely watching the shark for a few minutes we swam back to the boat where we clambered aboard only to continue the fun by jumping off the roof doing cannon balls, pencil dives, and maybe even a belly flop or two. Overall we had a great weekend and we are all looking forward to seeing our families.