Outside of fundraising the club has done a lot of advocacy work including making a video, getting signatures for a petition to regulate boat paths in Right Whale habitats, and writing letters to senators. Something they were especially proud of was organizing “whale week”  where they set up activities in homeroom everyday for a week, like jeopardy or a video. They also organized an event each day like a food sale or “whale a capella”. In the future, they hope to do outreach in Cambridge’s middle schools.

In addition to leading the club, Tessa’s role as president required her to create PowerPoints and handouts for meetings, running meetings, and delegating tasks to her 5 other peers on the leadership team. Tessa says that “the most exciting part [of starting the club] has been seeing how dedicated some members have been even with no prior experience or interest in marine science.”

If you are interested in donating to, providing advice, or have questions for to the Cambridge Rindge and Latin Marine Conservation Club, you can email crlsmarineconservationclub@gmail.com or Tessa directly at  tessatracy@gmail.com. Next year the club is focusing on sharks and are very excited!

Yesterday Kirsten Dawson (parent F’04, F’06, F’08), Linda Cabot (parent S’11, S’13) and Molly Cramer (parent S’08) attended the Women Working for Oceans (W2O) “Leave only Footprints” event at the New England Aquarium in Boston to learn from marine scientists about establishing and monitoring some amazing habitat: the Phoenix Islands marine protected area in the Pacific ocean. Past events have educated on issues of ocean plastics, the impact of auto emissions on climate change and oceans, as well as “fight with your fork” (choosing sustainable seafood, eco-friendly packaging, and vegetarian option) approaches to addressing climate change. They walk the talk too – the vegetarian lunch by the Aquarium chefs was amazing!

Women Working for Oceans always ends their lecture events with actions steps, so The Island School is too! Here are some things you can do:

1. Tell your parents how important their support is for the things you care about. They rock!
2. Join W2O as members, or have your parents join. We will see you at their upcoming events!
3. Participate in this cool Island School parent-led essay contest!
4. Do you work in marine conservation or have done some research? Share with us what you are working on by emailing alumni@islandschool.org. We want to celebrate your work!
5. Invite your parents to the January 4th, 2014 Island School 15 Year Celebration kickoff event. We will have events especially for IS parents. If they haven’t yet caught the IS fever from you, they will get inspired by the other amazing things Island School parents are doing to make a difference in the world.

After morning exercise, attendees had the opportunity to catch up with familiar faces and meet new friends before settling down with lunch to hear from our guest speakers. Cape Eleuthera Institute’s Edd Brooks spoke about his PhD shark research and his partnership with the New England Aquarium’s John Mandelman, PhD.

John focuses on the conservation physiology of marine fishes, predominantly elasmobranchs (the sharks, rays and skates) and their lethal and sublethal blood chemical responses to anthropogenic stressors – such as fishing capture and handling, and acoustic stress – in marine fishes. He is currently partnering up with Edd Brooks and CEI’s Shark Research & Conservation Program. Together they delivered a very interesting presentation that gave alumni an update on the type of research going on at CEI, and also how CEI is moving forward and partnering up with other successful organizations with the New England Aquarium. After Edd and John’s presentation, everyone had a chance to catch up some more, visit the Aquarium, and visit some of the aquarium’s scientists’ wet labs. At the end of the day, alumni left the Marriott and split into their respective semesters for dinner and other evening plans.

Thank you all who came to the reunion and made it such a success! We can’t wait to get everyone back together again! To see more photos from Saturday, see our Flickr album here.

Miss out on this reunion? Make sure you update us with your contact information so that you don’t miss out again! Email alumni@islandschool.org.