Floating Classroom with Journey Homeschools South Florida

Overview

On Monday, September 30th, 2024, The International SeaKeepers Society hosted a floating classroom with a of group 17 K-3 students and educators from Journey Homeschools South Florida aboard DISCOVERY Vessel River Queen in Biscayne Bay. We met our students and chaperones at FIU's Biscayne Bay campus and made our way through Oleta River State Park while discussing the coastal ecology of South Florida, as well as how the local watershed functions and results in different types of pollution in the bay. Following our introduction, we finished up our floating classroom by discussing the impacts of pollution on local marine health, especially during an active hurricane season where tides, wind, currents, and flooding can easily transport large quantities of marine debris over great distances. To put these teachings into practice, we finished our floating classroom with a coastal cleanup of one of our favorite Biscayne Bay picnic islands, Sandspur. Sandspur Island is particularly famous for its large concentration of marine debris from recreation and movement from tides. After a windy weekend, we were able to pick up over 17 pounds of debris in just 45 minutes! We were also sure to take the time to discuss some of our debris findings, how they might have reached the island, and the different steps that we can take in our daily lives to reduce, reuse, and recycle litter so that it does minimal harm to the environment.

We were happy to provide the students of Journey Homeschools South Florida with an experience out on the water with the help of our trusty D/Y River Queen. We hope that these students were able to leave the floating classroom with a better understanding of how pollution impacts our waterways and how we can prevent different types of pollution in our everyday lives. We had a great time hosting these students and educators and hope to work with them and other environmental learning groups more in the future!