Outreach and education: Coral craze!

This article is the third of a seven week-series of articles that highlight the activities of the Coral Reef Initiative summer interns stationed at CRMO and DEQ. This week, Education and Outreach intern, Janice Anne Castro describes her projects and work experience thus far.

One of the most elaborate, as well as intriguing tropical ecosystems around the world is the coral reef. Fortunately for us, the CNMI is surrounded by an abundance of these astonishing structures. Not only is their exquisiteness a major tourist attraction to the islands, but they also serve as homes to a great number of marine life. In addition Also, its their efficiency supplies the y communities worldwide with a variety of resources.

The Coral Reef Education and Outreach Program, a branch of the Coastal Resources Management Office (CRMO), is a program designed to better educate the public and community about the importance of coral reefs to the CNMI and the need to safeguard and protect them. As the intern of this program, an overview of my responsibilities would be the designing and implementing evaluations of existing education and outreach projects, as well as developing other educational material.

I heard about this internship through the secretary of the Northern Marianas Academy. I decided to apply for one of the positions since I have intentions on pursuing a profession in the environmental field. My first choice was to become the education and outreach intern for as it had the most appealing job description and I had have had previous experiences in public outreach, as well as developing educational material with an imaginative and creative edge.

For the past five weeks, I have been creating and finalizing a number of informative placemats. These placemats each contain information about coral reefs and/or the marine life associated with it them, integrated into different fun and exciting games. John Moreno, the Education and Outreach Coordinator and my mentor, thought that it would be a unique and entertaining way of educating the community after seeing a local establishment using the same placemat/game concept. We designed five placemats with five different games: Word Search, Spot the Difference, Marine Debris Maze, Word Scramble, and Find Me.

In addition to creating the informative placemats, I had other interesting side projects. I also scanned and prepared the past publications of the Environment Page in order to create an archive within CRMO’s website. Moreover, I helped provided the text to be used in a recruitment page for people who might be interested in working with CRMO in the CNMI. This will be placed in job announcements, classified ads, etc. Keep checking www.crm.gov.mp for updates.

In the weeks to come, I will be working on the preparations of developing a number of public service announcements (or PSAs,) to air on both cable and radio. These PSA’s will be epigrammatic messages concerning safeguarding the environment from pollution and trash, protecting the coral reefs, the “Walk it, Don’t Drive it” campaign, etc. Living on a relatively small island, it is necessary for everyone to help do their part in maintaining a strong and healthy environment, among other important things. Knowledge is the first step to making a difference, and these PSA’s will assist in expanding the conception of environmental awareness.

In the past few weeks, I have gained a better knowledge about the environment, coral reefs, biodiversity, and other things that make the environment go round. I’m very blissful of having this opportunity of to get getting a head start on building my career. When my internship comes to an end, I will be leaving to for Washington to study and major in Environmental Studies at Seattle University. Afterwards, I fully intend on to returning return and givinge back to the islands, which have taken care of me for 18 years, by being an advocate of clean and healthy living.

If you are interested in the aforementioned educational yet fun filled placemats for your place of business, please contact Janice Castro at CRMO, at 664-8300/01. We will be posting PDF files of our placemats on our website, www.crm.gov.mp., in the coming weeks. (Janice Ann Castro)