By Lindsay Dade Coral reefs in the Caribbean are essential resources for food, storm protection, tourism, and recreation. Hard corals, which are the building blocks of coral reefs, are struggling to recover from disturbances like bleaching and coral disease. Some coral restoration practitioners, including organizations like The Nature Conservancy, are…

NRT Strong Coasts fellow, Martha Mcalister, recently attended the International System Dynamics Conference (ISDC) and shared her perspective on key presentations via the conference website blog. This post was originally published on the System Dynamics Society’s wiSDom blog on August 17, 2021 and is shared here with permission from the…

By Addie Buerck (USF fellow), Allison Holevoet (UVI fellow), Heather Hopkins (project coordinator), and Megan Kramer (USF fellow) In April 2021, Strong Coasts was invited to participate in Stewart Middle Magnet School’s (https://www.hillsboroughschools.org/stewart) virtual Earth Day celebration. Three Strong Coasts fellows, Addie Buerck (USF), Allison Holevoet (UVI), and Megan Kramer…

By Sophia Costa The world has been sitting back and watching as some of the most unthinkable natural disasters have occurred in the year 2020. In addition to historic global pandemics, the U.S. alone suffered from intensive hurricanes throughout the Gulf of Mexico, mass fires in the western parts of…

By W. Alex Webb We often think of museums as the caretakers of history. Large buildings exhibiting what are now exotic artifacts and displays creating windows into worlds that once were. In the past museums were committed to a singular, official history. Over time however, it has become devastatingly clear…

By Estenia Ortiz Carabantes “Science includes justice, they are not mutually exclusive.” This was one of the many powerful takeaways I received from being a part of the Thriving Earth Exchange Science, Policy, and Engagement cohort (SPEC) trainings last September. This program stands for community science. Community science is when…

By Michelle Platz Data collection has officially concluded for the season at our two reef restoration sites in the Florida Keys! Since installing BEAMS monitoring systems on each reef in early July, we have outplanted over 150 coral fragments, have collected over 500,000 datapoints, and survived two tropical storms. …

By Yoel Gebrai The 2020 Strong Coasts webinar series continued with another great webinar on October 13, 2020 by Dr. Cassandra Workman. Dr. Workman is a biocultural medical anthropologist and her presentation was titled “Understanding Complex Resource Insecurity: Interdisciplinary Approaches and Future Directions.” Dr. Workman explored the connections and interactions…

By Kris-An Hinds So here we are, in the middle of what many people thought was going to be a potential apocalypse. Did I expect to be conducting research during this time? No. At the beginning of my adventures as a PhD student at the University of South Florida, I…