Cacique Update

Summer Term Journals

There’s a new assignment in town this Summer Term, and it’s called a journal entry! Students are being asked to regularly reflect on activities and experiences they have had throughout the day or week. These assignments allow our students to connect information across multiple disciplines, from where our food comes from on an island, to the effects of tourism and development on the surrounding ecosystems and communities. To give you a taste of what these reflections consist of we have included excerpts from two recent journals from Claire Miles and Tommy Robertshaw. Claire just returned from a South Eleuthera Road Trip, where she and 12 other students toured the Rock Sound caves and ocean hole, watched the creation of conch salad from shell to plate, and talked with local Bahamians in Deep Creek settlement. Tommy’s reflection delves into the interconnectedness of local ecosystems and tourism and development after spending the night at Palm Island beach on his two-day kayak trip. Both of these journal entries are excellent examples of the depth of reflection we hope to see in these assignments. Enjoy!

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Claire Miles

“…Along with the general negative economic trend in the world, Eleuthera is facing a problem with a declining tourism industry, an industry that much of the Bahamas depends on. This makes me wonder, what are people Continue reading →

Cacique Update

Cacique Update June 29, 2012

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During our first day of SCUBA diving, Weston and I, Lizzie, were the two Caciques. Having opposite amounts of experience, I was extremely nervous, whereas Weston was eager to jump in. The first dive did not sit well with me. I hopped out of the water and went to lunch, but could not stop thinking about my second dive in only forty-five minutes. When I reached the bottom of my second dive, my fears suddenly melted away as I explored the beautiful, Bahamian scenery. Although my SCUBA diving experience got off to a rocky start, I couldn’t help but love the beautiful scenery 25 feet below the surface.

My name is Weston Albury and I was one of the Caciques yesterday and Wednesday night. I was chosen by Tommy and Larissa for my amazing energy and uplifting attitude. As part of the SCUBA program for the first week we had a really fun couple of days. I was part of team barracuda and we had a really fun time. On the first day we did a confined water dive off the dock. After lunch we went on our first open water dive to a place called the saddle. This is the name of the dive site because the bottom is in the shape of a saddle. I loved diving in the saddle because there were these really cool walls that went up the sides of the saddle that had some juvenile fairy basslets. Today I will be SCUBA certified and can go diving with anyone!

Kayak Caciques Silas and Aiko!

While on the K1 trip we stopped and learned about mangrove trees. Continue reading →

CEI

Summer Aquaculture Intern Blog: Drew Villeneuve

Hey Everybody! My name is Drew and I am an Aquaculture intern at CEI this summer. I’m from Maryland and just graduated from high school in DC; I will be attending Bowdoin College in Maine this fall where I hope to study Biology and English. In the past I have volunteered/interned at the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum and National Zoo. My specific interest is in Invertebrates, so it’s a change of pace for me to be working with fish! At the museum I worked primarily with deep water invertebrates that were pulled from Lophelia reefs in the Gulf of Mexico collected before and after the oil spill in 2010, all in hopeful preparation for some comparative analyses, and I worked at the Zoo in the Invertebrate exhibit maintaining some of their tanks. In my spare time I like to work on my marine aquarium, whitewater kayak on the Potomac, read, and explore the Appalachian mountains.

If you are not already aware, the aquaculture team (Marie, Tyler, and I) with the help of a lot of other awesome CEI people transferred our cobia to the offshore cage. For the past week or so we have been making daily dives on the cage to feed the cobia Continue reading →

Alumni

Update from Bradley Watson and Garniesha Pinder in China: Turning Straw into Bio-Gas

Yesterday we visited a Bio-Gas plant that processed mostly straw into Bio-Gas. Just as straw is more difficult to process for animals than grains, it is also harder to produce Bio-Gas from than manure or sugar filled waste water from breweries. The molecules that make straw stiff also make the energy contained in the straw difficult for the bacteria in a Bio-Digester to access and convert to methane gas and carbon dioxide. This plant takes the straw and grinds it into a fine powder and then mixes this powder with warm water before feeding the mixture into a 500 cubic meter Bio-Digester. Grinding the straw makes it easier for the bacteria in the digester to break it down. The other unique thing about this plant is that they recycle the water used in the digester. The digested straw powder is separated from the water mechanically and the water is recycled through the system. This also maintains a steady population of bacteria in the system and eliminates the need for mixing of the digester contents.

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This project’s startup was subsidized by the government and encourages farmers in this semi- rural community to transport their waste straw to the plant instead of burning it by offering them bio- gas at production cost. Continue reading →

Cacique Update

Cacique Update June 26, 2012

Hello Island School parents!

This is the first of many daily updates from the Caciques! “Cacique” is a Lucayan word for leader, so each day we pass off the Cacique role to two new student leaders of the day. Even after only two full days on campus, we’ve already had a handful of great experiences! One of the most notable was our float down the Current Cut, a small man-made channel with a quick current running through it. During the course of our dive, we encountered a plethora of colorful aquatic life including Nassau groupers, barracudas, nurse sharks, schoolmaster snapper, and jacks. George’s ankles have been severely bitten by bugs because he has no hair in said location. But don’t worry Mr. and Mrs. Reich, he is thriving in this uniquely humid environment, and is maintaining his perfectly coiffed hair which we all enjoy.

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On a different note, the morning exercise has been both challenging and exciting. Continue reading →

Deep Creek Middle School

DCMS Book Camp

This week, Deep Creek Middle School is hosting its first Book Camp. The enthusiastic campers are reading together, writing poetry, playing word games, and learning more about the publishing industry. Organized by former DCMS teacher Megan Kelly (2006 – 2010) and assisted by DCMS alumna Jhane Gibson (2011), the camp’s main texts are The Strange Case of the Origami Yoda and Wonder. Campers will interview the authors of both books, as well as the Head of Macmillan Publishing’s Caribbean Division, in order to learn more about how books are created.

The first day’s activities included creating their own Origami Yodas, designing postcards that will feature their poetry, and writing six-word memoirs to introduce themselves (it’s harder than it sounds!). A few of the awesome memoirs: “My brain means everything to me,” “I’m nice and beautiful, don’t hate,” “Sometimes the strong aren’t strong enough,” and “My headaches come from Nicki Minaj.” The fun has only just begun at Book Camp!

You can read more about Book Camp here.

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Cacique Update

The Summer Term Students Have Arrived!

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After many weeks of anticipation, the Summer Term 2012 students have finally arrived on campus! They spent a packed first day together, beginning with a short snorkel to a wreck off of Boys Dorm Beach. David touched a sea cucumber for the first time and Bethlehem discovered her love of sea biscuits – a small glimpse into the innumerable new discoveries awaiting each student over the course of the summer. Later in the morning, we talked about the geography of The Bahamas and Eleuthera, and then raced each other in a sustainable systems scavenger hunt as a first introduction to some of The Island School’s eco-friendly systems. Students this semester are split into “work groups” and assigned a color.

Energy levels are high and students and faculty are bursting with excitement as we hit the ground running for an intense next six weeks. Stay tuned for more from updates from the Summer Term 2012 team!

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Summer Term Prep is Complete!

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If anyone is excited about the upcoming start of Summer Term, it’s Fritter. He has been lonely these past few weeks with the absence of students on campus, and is especially excited to see so many new faces and to practice begging for his typical six meals a day. He has remained camped out on the deck, alternating between keeping an eye out for arriving students and napping in his chair.

However, Fritter is not the only one looking forward to the student’s arrival. The Summer Term team has been prepping for the past week, with new mentors running around campus discovering our sustainable systems and then venturing out to explore the island of Eleuthera. We are all ready and excited to kick off the Summer Term once all of the students are on campus. All that is left to do is wait!

Cape Eleuthera Institute, CEI

UNC-Chapel Hill Morehead Cain-Scholar Interning at CEI

We are thrilled to have UNC-Chapel Hill Morehead-Cain scholar Stephan Grabner with us this summer!  Stephan joins us as the CEI Systems Intern on his third summer of the four-summer Morehead-Cain summer enrichment program. Though Stephan is a philosophy major at UNC, he will be helping Marco with biodiesel production this summer at CEI.

How does a philosophy major end up hands-on with biodiesel? For Stephan it is part of an interdisciplinary approach he is taking to find connections between sustainable development, ethics, and economics.

Stephan’s journey to Eleuthera has been a long one. Originally hailing from Vienna, Austria Stephan went on to high school at the United World College of the American West in Montezuma, in New Mexico—a small international boarding school with students from roughly 100 countries. UWC nominated Stephan for the Morehead-Cain, which had only just been opened up to international candidates.

Congratulations and Welcome Stephan!

Alumni, Cape Eleuthera Institute, CEI

CEI Welcomes its Summer Interns, Including Six IS Alumni

This week, 16 summer interns arrived on Eleuthera to work at Cape Eleuthera Institute. Of those 16, we were excited to welcome back 6 Island School alumni who spent a semester, summer term, or divemaster course here on the Cape over the last 6 years. Mackey Violich (F’06), Elizabeth Douglas (S’08), Jasmine Wilchcombe (F’08), Grace Dennis (Su’10), Chris Daniell (F’10) and Jake Verter (S’09) will be here supporting the Shark and Aquaponics programs for the next two months! We’re glad to have you back!
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