By Mackenzie Nelson
Sea Grant Program fellowships give students the opportunity to apply the skills they developed during their graduate careers to solve real world problems with professionals in the marine science and policy fields. This year eight SMEA graduates were selected for the John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship, the Washington Sea Grant State Fellowship (formerly the Marc Hershman Fellowship), and the Alaska Sea Grant State Fellowship. 

By Allie Brown
Ask any SMEA student who recently graduated what their highlight of the year was and it’ll likely be just that, graduating. Finishing the thesis, capstone, course load, etcetera and promptly going to Agua Verde across the street in celebration, or possibly going home and taking a much deserved nap. But graduation isn’t all the good stuff that happened in the past year. 

The start of the new school year is just around the corner and it won’t be long before the UW campus is buzzing with students and faculty back in class. But before we move forward into this new academic year, we wanted a chance to reflect back on SMEA’s most recent graduating class. Two recent grads, Danielle Edelman and Valerie Cleland, look back at their time at SMEA sharing their experiences, insights and take aways. 

Congratulations to Zelin Chen who has been awarded a Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) Scholarship Research Program award. Zelin will apply his award towards his research into quota-based management of the Chinese red swimmer crab fishery. Red swimming crab is valuable to local fishing communities in China and plays an important role in global seafood trade. Zelin will study the perceptions of key stakeholders and review existing literature. 

Second year graduate student Celeste Barnes-Crouse was recently interviewed by the UW Graduate School about Seattle’s ban on single-use plastic take-out containers, straws and utensils that took effect in July. In the article, Celeste discusses Seattle’s plastic straw ban and states “I think 2018 will be remembered as the year hating plastics became cool.” In 2017, Seattle hosted the first city-wide campaign, called Strawless in Seattle, to help remove single-use plastic straws from the U.S. 

A big congratulations to recent SMEA graduate Valerie Cleland who was selected as a Washington Sea Grant John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellow for 2019. The 2019 finalists will become the 40th class of the John A. Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship program. The 66 finalists represent 30 of the 33 Sea Grant programs. For the first time Guam Sea Grant successfully recruited a Knauss fellow.  

On Thursday, June 7, the School of Marine and Environmental Affairs held its graduation ceremony in the Fishery Sciences Auditorium. A welcome was given by SMEA Director, Terrie Klinger, followed by opening remarks from the College of the Environment Dean, Lisa J. Graumlich. The keynote address was delivered by Rosenburg Professor of Environmental Studies, Emeritus, Williams College and former Program Officer for Science at the Packard Foundation, Dr. 

Alaska Sea Grant recently announced the six graduate students that were selected to spend a year working with state and federal agencies to support healthy coastal communities and the marine environment. Three of the six 2018-19 State Fellows are SMEA students; Nyssa Baechler, Diana Perry, and Kayla Schommer. The fellowships strengthen Alaska’s workforce by cultivating future professionals working in marine science and policy, fisheries, and related disciplines. 

Currents is SMEA’s student-run blog dedicated to sharing timely and relevant discussions of pressing environmental issues, particularly in regards to marine and coastal systems and the interactions between humans and nature. Throughout the school year these students write posts about topics they find interesting and relevant in ocean science and policy. For the month of May they decided to try something a little different; they are running a series they’ve titled Simply Science. 

Congratulations to Lily Zhao on being awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) fellowship. Zhao was the awardee for ‘Human Dimensions of Coral Reefs’. The fellowship will allow Zhao to continue her doctorate studies and research on how coral reefs and the coastal communities that depend on them can best recover from severe environmental shocks.
In all, the NSF named 2,000 individuals as this year’s recipients of awards from its Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP).