On Friday, June 10th, Judy O’Neil and I participated in the second annual Billion Oyster Projects Curriculum and Community Enterprise for Restoration Science (BOP CCERS) - Science, Technology, Engineering and Math education (STAM) Research Symposium on Governors Island.

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The week of June 6th brought strong winds to the east coast along with the 2nd annual workshop meeting of Billion Oyster Projects Curriculum and Community Enterprise for Restoration Science (BOP CCERS) project members. This was a weeklong series of events and meetings in NYC that gave project leaders both a chance to reflect on the year's achievements and to tweak project goals for the third, and final year of the National Science Foundation (NSF) funded project.

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Judy O'Neil led the effort to write a synthesis paper about New York Harbor, as part of the Curriculum and Community Enterprise for Restoration Science (CCERS), a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded project, focused on the expansion of concepts imbedded within the Billion Oyster Project. The paper will contribute to the World Harbour Project.

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On Friday, June 19th, Judy O’Neil, Suzi Spitzer and I had our final exciting stop on a three-day trip to New York City that so far had been lively, productive, and engaging. This was the day of the inaugural BOP STEM Symposium out at Governors Island, what was to be a massive gathering of middle and high school students, teachers, and partners on the STEM project. This event helped to finally put some faces (all smiles) to the work that we have been doing over the past few months.

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On June 17th and 18th, Judy O’Neil, Simon Costanzo, Suzi Spitzer and I traveled north to New York City to attend a series of meetings and events leading up to the inaugural Billion Oyster Project Symposium. This very productive trip will be split into two blog posts, one for the first two days of events, talks, and meetings, and another for the official Billion Oyster Project Science, Technology,Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Symposium on Friday, June 19th.

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As part of our involvement in the New York Harbor. I read "The Great Bridge: The epic story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge" by David McCollough. It was a wonderful read, providing historical context and delving into the fascinating story of the three Roeblings who were key to the effort:

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As part of our collaborative Harbor School project with the Billion Oyster Project--Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) team, I visited the New York Aquarium in December 2014, two years following the devastation of Hurricane Sandy. The Aquarium is run by the Wildlife Conservation Society who also run four New York City zoos (Bronx Zoo, Central Park Zoo, Queens Zoo and Prospect Park Zoo).

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In late October 2014, I travelled to New York City to represent IAN at the media launch of a new National Science Foundation (NSF) project based in New York Harbor and led by PACE University. It’s a pretty big deal to receive major funding from the NSF and this is the first NSF project that I have been involved in. For it to be based in one of the most famous cities in the world is an added bonus.

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