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Announcing the 2025 Knauss Fellows and
executive branch placements
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Sea Grant is thrilled to announce the fellows for the 2025 class of the Knauss Marine Policy Fellowship. This year, for the first time in program history, all eligible Sea Grant programs are represented by a diverse cohort of 88 early-career professionals who will spend the next year working alongside federal agencies or legislative offices in Washington, D.C., applying their academic expertise to critical marine, coastal and Great Lakes policy issues.
Read the announcement
The executive branch fellows recently completed their Placement Week and learned which Washington, D.C. area offices will host them for their one-year marine policy fellowship beginning in February.
See the 2025 executive branch fellow placements
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Sea Grant and NOAA Fisheries announce 2024 joint fellowship program awardees
Sea Grant and NOAA Fisheries are excited to announce the 2024 National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS)-Sea Grant Joint Fellowship recipients. This year, seven population dynamics fellows and three marine resource economics fellows will embark on critical fisheries research with support through this national program.
Read the announcement
Additional NMFS-Sea Grant Fellowship Updates:
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Check out a recap from the annual NMFS-Sea Grant Joint Fellows Symposium, which took place in Hawaiʻi in September.
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Fellow Katrina Munsterman released her film "Fish for Tomorrow" about the challenges facing small-scale fishing communities in the Bahamas.
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NOAA Sea Grant & Weather Program Office award $1.5 million for community flooding social science liaisons
The Department of Commerce and NOAA announced $22.78 million in funding to NOAA labs, programs, cooperative institutes and other research partners to advance research on a wide range of water-driven climate impacts. Through this initiative, NOAA’s National Sea Grant and Weather Program Office awarded $1.5 million to the Maryland and Puerto Rico Sea Grant programs to hire community flooding social science liaisons who will use social, economic and behavioral research with the community-based capabilities of the Sea Grant network to facilitate the implementation of flood inundation mapping services for Maryland and Puerto Rico emergency responders, water managers and the public.
Learn more about the projects
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Sea Grant announces 2024 Young Fishermen’s Career Development projects
Sea Grant is pleased to announce the selection of four projects aimed at developing and executing local, regional and national programs, workshops and services to help fishers enter career paths, supporting the Young Fishermen’s Development Act. These four projects were selected through a competitive process that included national review panels. The selected projects will be based in Maine, California and Washington.
Learn more about the projects
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Funding opportunity for strengthening U.S. aquaculture through business support
Subject to the availability of funding, Sea Grant anticipates that approximately $5,000,000 will be available in FY2024 and FY2025 federal funds for research projects and programs that will focus on strengthening U.S. coastal, marine and Great Lakes aquaculture via support for the development of new aquaculture businesses, as well as enhancing existing aquaculture business output, efficiency and profitability. Strong applications will integrate research and extension. Letters of Intent are due December 4, 2024.
See details about the funding opportunity
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Marine debris grantee, PolyGone, hosts grand opening of their microplastic removal pilot
In September, PolyGone Systems opened their Microplastic Removal Pilot Project and Educational Pavilion at the Atlantic County Utilities Authority Wastewater Treatment Facility in New Jersey. PolyGone Systems specializes in developing novel microplastic filtration technology and they will work with the wastewater treatment plant to monitor and remove microplastic pollutants. This pioneering industrial-scale pilot project is funded by the 2023 NOAA Sea Grant Marine Debris Challenge Competition and the NJCSIT Pilot CleanTech Demonstration Grant Program.
Read about the grand opening event
Learn more about this project and others from Sea Grant’s marine debris competitions in this NOAA feature story
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Sea Grant By the Numbers highlights impacts from 2023 federal investment
Sea Grant released a new factsheet that highlights the impacts of Sea Grant’s work between February 1, 2023, and January 31, 2024, the latest reporting cycle. In 2023, a federal investment in Sea Grant of $94 million resulted in $828.3 million economic benefit. Sea Grant supported 22,251 jobs and 1,479 businesses. Additionally, Sea Grant helped restore or protect 15,971,268 acres of habitat and 2,213,482 people engaged in Sea Grant education programs.
See the full factsheet here
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Celebrating Seafood Month around the Network
October is National Seafood Month. Learn how Sea Grant programs are encouraging the production and consumption of sustainable U.S. seafood:
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USC Sea Grant receives award for youth summer social justice STEAM camp
USC Sea Grant recently received the Champion of Girls Award from the EmpowHer Institute, a prominent nonprofit based in Los Angeles that is dedicated to empowering young women in marginalized communities. The award specifically acknowledged USC Sea Grant’s partnership with the EmpowHer Social Justice STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) Camp, a program that provides BIPOC girls ages 11-15 in Los Angeles County the opportunity to explore STEAM as a means to tackle environmental justice issues affecting their communities.
Read about the award celebration
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Hawai‘i Sea Grant visits Florida Sea Grant for special Voice of the Sea episode
Hawai‘i Sea Grant's award-winning Voice of the Sea television program traveled to the Gulf of Mexico and caught up with Florida Sea Grant researchers and partners to learn about farming clams, oysters and sponges. The collaborative episode shares how these filter feeders and ongoing work are helping to clean the water, provide nursery habitat and support a thriving industry.
Watch the episode
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Join the Coastal Inundation Community
of Practice
NOAA's Office for Coastal Management, the National Sea Grant Office and the American Society of Adaptation Professionals are collaboratively building and facilitating the Coastal Inundation Community of Practice to advance resilience to flooding now and in the future. The Coastal Inundation Community of Practice is a national network of practitioners that facilitates peer-to-peer learning, information exchange and collaborative engagement to advance coastal flooding science, knowledge and solutions.
Learn more about the community of practice
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Recap from the Liaisons Corner: DinoSHIELD outreach workshops
Sea Grant Liaisons integrate research and end-user needs by connecting Sea Grant extension expertise with science, products and services from NOAA labs and other publicly supported scientific research programs. In the latest blog, Harmful Algal Bloom Liaison Betty Staugler shares her collaborative work to coordinate outreach about technology to help control red tides. The workshop series sought to engage key Florida partners to provide them with information on DinoSHIELD technology and to solicit feedback during this research phase.
Read Staugler's blog
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Guam Sea Grant helps rescue endangered orchids
The University of Guam Center for Island Sustainability and Sea Grant’s Natural Resources team recently rescued threatened species of native orchid left vulnerable. Some of the species are only found naturally in Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas. This rescue is just one part of the work the team is doing to protect, preserve and conserve the natural resources on Guam.
See the full story
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Artists blend science and creativity to highlight the importance of Georgia’s coastal ecosystems
Five artists from the Georgia cities of Savannah, Augusta, Kennesaw, Athens and St. Simons have launched projects that explore Georgia’s coastal culture and natural resources through Georgia Sea Grant’s Artists, Writers, and Scholars program. This marks the fourth year of the program, which has supported 14 projects. This year’s projects will use a variety of art forms—including photography, film, mixed media, non-traditional techniques, and illustration—to highlight cultural connections to native plants, the challenges facing maritime forests, the history of coastal management protection, and the ecological role of oysters.
Learn more about the projects
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In pictures: COAST Weather Wise training | |
Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium's COAST (Community Outreach and Strategic Training) Resilience Institute is a year-long training program aimed at equipping local leaders, municipal staff and community decision-makers with the latest science-based research for enhancing decision-making and increasing resilience. In September (National Preparedness Month), the Institute's Weather Wise training took place. Check out photos from the training taken by Melissa Schneider below. | |
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Upcoming Sea Grant symposiums
Marine Debris Symposium | November 12-14, 2024
Want to learn about Sea Grant’s work in marine debris prevention and removal? It is not too late to register for virtual attendance for the annual Sea Grant Marine Debris Symposium.
See the agenda and register for virtual attendance
Climate Ready Workforce Virtual Symposium | December 3-5, 2024
The first annual Climate-Ready Workforce Symposium brings together nine awardee teams from the National Climate Assessment ten regions to share project updates and discuss workforce development that will advance climate resilience nationwide. These projects were selected for funding through the 2023 Inflation Reduction Act Climate-Ready Workforce for Coastal States, Tribes & Territories Competition.
See the agenda and register for virtual attendance
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In memoriam
David Fuller, Northwest Florida Clean Boating Coordinator with Florida Sea Grant, has unexpectedly passed. David was a valued member of the Florida Sea Grant team and his passion for the sea and nature was the driving force behind his contributions.
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Featured publications
Check out some of Sea Grant's recent publications:
National Needs Assessment of Aquaculture at Minority Serving Institutions
The National Sea Grant Office recently published a needs assessment of aquaculture and related education programs at Minority Serving Institutions. Kaitlyn Theberge, a 2023 Knauss Fellow with the National Sea Grant Office, supported the report's development. This needs assessment is intended to be a starting point for exploring the aquaculture work being conducted at MSIs and opportunities for further engagement.
Hawaiʻi Sea Grant collaborative research featured on the cover of Science
A team of researchers from NOAA Fisheries Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, the Papahānaumokuākea Marine Debris Project and Hawai‘i Sea Grant examined Hawaiian monk seal entanglement records spanning over 40 years, both before and after large-scale marine debris removal efforts were initiated, and found a substantial reduction in the rate of entanglement where the debris removal effort was most concentrated. The team’s work—“Four decades of Hawaiian monk seal entanglement data reveal the benefits of plastic debris removal”—was published as the cover story in the September 26, 2024 issue of the journal Science.
Helping threatened Alaska communities adapt
A report authored by Alaska Sea Grant shines a light on the challenges remote communities face in taking advantage of resources for addressing environmental threats caused by a rapidly warming Arctic. It provides insight and details regarding climate adaptation planning across the state and recommendations for federal funding agencies, communities planners, nonprofits and others to help them get assistance to all communities in need.
The Invasive Species Language Workshop final report
The Invasive Species Language Workshop, hosted by Sea Grant and the North American Invasive Species Management Association in Washington, D.C. during National Invasive Awareness Week in February 2024, brought together more than a dozen researchers and practitioners from across environmental disciplines and agencies to address communication needs in invasive species outreach strategies and develop a path forward. The full workshop report is now available on Michigan Sea Grant’s website
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Funding and career opportunities
Sea Grant career opportunities Sea Grant has several job openings across the country, including Coastal Resilience Specialist with Alaska Sea Grant, Social Scientist Extension Specialist with California Sea Grant and Web Designer with Louisiana Sea Grant.
FY 2025 Opportunity for Strengthening U.S. Aquaculture through Business Support Subject to the availability of funding, Sea Grant anticipates that approximately $5,000,000 will be available in FY2024 and FY2025 federal funds for research projects and programs that will focus on strengthening U.S. coastal, marine and Great Lakes aquaculture via support for the development of new aquaculture businesses, as well as enhancing existing aquaculture business output, efficiency and profitability. Letters of Intent are due December 4, 2024.
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Opportunities and updates from partners
New U.S. sea level change website The Interagency Task Force on Sea Level Change (DOD, EPA, FEMA, NASA, NOAA, USACE, USAID and USGS) has published a new website that delivers sea level rise projections for the U.S. in an interactive and educational format that allows users to explore past, present, and future sea level rise, associated impacts, and adaptation measures for their area. The scientific information on this site is coupled with foundational educational content and interactive explainers, key takeaways, videos and audio explainers designed to help users better understand the data to make science-based decisions.
Climate Mental Health Network resources The Climate Mental Health Network provides tips and worksheets that can offer support while navigating climate- and extreme weather-related challenges.
NOAA Ocean Acidification Program FY 2025 funding opportunity The NOAA Ocean Acidification Program requests proposals for collaborative projects that synthesize ocean and coastal acidification information at a regional scale. This announcement specifically addresses priorities for how ocean and coastal acidification affect human communities in the context of ocean change. Approximately 1–6 projects for up to 3 years in duration may be funded at the level of approximately $100,000 – $400,000 per year per proposal. Access the full announcement for all details and to apply. Required letters of intent are due November 20, 2024.
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