COSEE - Pacific Partnerships

Jan Hodder, Oregon Institute of Marine Biology, University of Oregon, COSEE
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I am the director of one of the National Science Foundation funded Centers for Ocean Science Education Excellence (COSEE), http://www.cosee.net. One of the goals of my center, COSEE – Pacific Partnerships, is to increase the opportunities for community college faculty and students to learn about the ocean. COSEE – Pacific Partnerships is based at marine laboratories in Oregon, Washington, Hawaii and northern California and aims to connect research scientists with community college faculty and students. To date we have offered in-year and summer workshops that have engaged faculty and research scientists in exploring marine biology and oceanography. In these workshops we have covered current research topics and have started to work on developing course materials suited for community college use. We have also developed a research experience program, Promoting Research Investigations in the Marine Environment (PRIME), which provides community college students with the opportunity to work with a researcher at a marine laboratory for an eight week period in the summer. Further information on these projects is at http://www.coseepacificpartnerships.org/. I am a research scientist and educator at the University of Oregon's marine lab and I come to this meeting to learn about geoscience education from the workshop participants. I am interested in exploring how the COSEE network could play a role in advancing ocean literacy at community colleges, and hope to make connections with engaged faculty to further our goals.