Outreach Efforts
Education and outreach is an important part of the CRM program. This aspect of the agency aims to educate and involve the public in natural resource management because without a supportive and knowledgeable community, most of our programs could not be nearly as successful.
Outreach:
The Outreach component of the CRM program attempts to provide education beyond
conventional methods to “reach out” to many different audiences
in the community. Our personnel are active participants in many outreach
activities and have a number of outreach materials available:
- Expositions-throughout the year there are many events that we participate
in to give presentations, displays, and even organize games that emphasizes
the importance of coastal resources protection:
- Environmental Awareness Week Exposition (EAW Expo)
- CNMI Recycles Day
- 2006 EcoArts Festival
- 2004 Rota Watershed Fair
- 2004 Build a Castle Save a Reef sandcastle building competition
- Northern Marianas College Career Fair
- Presentations – Many of the CRM staff members are available to give talks or presentations about the different aspects of the CRM program to schools, organizations and businesses. Contact us for more information.
- Saipan Tribune Environment Page – From October 7, 2004, until present, outreach staff have written articles on environmental topics for the Environment Page of the Saipan Tribune.
- CRI Summer Internship program –for the last two summers, we have had 7 summer interns working at the natural resource management agencies (CRM, DEQ, and DFW). Their projects included developing a survey for a watershed outreach campaign, ortho-rectifying aerial photographs, and assisting in coral reef research efforts, to name a few.
- MARAMP website – an educational website was developed for the biannual Marianas Archipelago Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program, on board the NOAA vessel Oscar Elton Sette where an onboard educator posted daily logs from the field, wrote feature articles, and answered questions submitted to the website. Log on at www.crm.gov.mp/MARAMP to check it out!
- Outreach-related meetings and trainings – a series of meetings and trainings were held to increase managerial support for outreach and education, and to assist in outreach planning efforts within the three management agencies. A contractor from Canada was hired to facilitate individual meetings at CRM, DEQ, and DFW, as well as with the coral reef committees. The contractor also ran two training sessions: an introductory message development seminar for a broad audience, and a more targeted session on creating outreach campaigns.
- Participation in regional training event – Eight staff members from CRM, DEQ, DFW, and the Western Pacific Fisheries Management Council attended a regional outreach and education training session in Hawaii. CNMI’s attendees showcased outreach materials they had produced, and participated in a panel on the various types of media that can be used for outreach.
- Volunteer monitoring – CRM staff members assist in the community and school volunteer reef flat monitoring program run by the CNMI Marine Monitoring Team. This data is used by our scientists to monitor the trends in our marine environment that can help in implementing policies to protect the marine resources.
- Assistance with grant creation – CRM and CRI staff have assisted local community members to successfully apply for two NFWF grants. One was awarded to three high school teachers to implement a marine monitoring program with their students. The other was awarded to the Marianas Resource Conservation and Development Council to hire a Public Involvement Coordinator (PIC). The PIC will work with CRM, DEQ, and DFW to help recruit and retain volunteers.
- Small grants program – In 2004, two small grants were awarded, one to ARC environmental services to create an environmental curriculum, and one to Marinas RC&D Council to create interpretive signs for a wetland project. Because the process was unwieldy, and it was difficult to retain applicants, the small grants program was changed. In 2006, we are awarding four smaller grants, primarily to teachers for classroom and field-based projects.
Outreach materials –
- 5 educational placemats were created with the help of student interns to distribute to local restaurants. Topics covered by the placemats include marine debris, fish identification, a coral reef word scramble, and coral reef friendly tips for fishermen.
- Magnet with coral reef friendly diving and snorkeling tips
- Posters about marine debris and the value of coral reefs
- Snorkeling and diving brochure
- Coral reef friendly boating display for Boater’s Awareness Week
- Permit process brochure
- Environmental trivia game
- PowerPoint presentation on CNMI Coral Reefs (importance, threats, what you can do), and Hazardous Marine Life and General Marine Safety, Fish Identification
- “Our Environment Today” Non-point Source Pollution PSAs that address sedimentation, and vehicle and boat issues.
- CNMI’s Coral Reefs: Dive, snorkel, protect video – A video on best practices while diving and snorkeling was produced by a contractor, and will be shown on the Visitor’s Channel (Channel 3) as well as incoming flights to the CNMI.
- CNMI Fishing Regulations Booklet – In conjunction with DFW, the CRM Outreach coordinator has created a fishing regulations brochure. The brochure incorporates educational material and simplifies the regulations for local fishermen.
Education:
The Education component of CRM tries to impart knowledge, instruction, enlightenment,
and stewardship towards coastal resource protection and restoration. Several
curricula have been created for CRM to assist teachers in educating students
these issues:
- Coral reef trunks for elementary school teachers.
- Watershed curriculum.
- The CNMI Environmental Science Curriculum for middle school is now available. ARC Environmental Services was awarded a small grant to create the curriculum.
- A grade K-12 coral reef curriculum is currently up for contract.