Breakout Session

23. Increasing Diversity Among Ocean and Coastal Leaders

Coordinator: Ariana Marshall NOAA Environmental Cooperative Sciences Center and Florida A & M University

Moderator: Gillian Bowser, Warner College of Natural Resources, Colorado State University

Discussants:

Opening Remarks: Dr. Larry Robinson, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, NOAA

1. April Croxton, NMFS/NEFSC/AED/BB
   
2. Kasim Ortiz, University of South Carolina, Environmental & Earth Resource Management Program
   
3. Shereitte Stokes IV, Spelman College

Summary:

The goal of this session is to develop recommendations on how to increase the diversity of scientists, managers, and other professionals engaged with coastal and marine issues. This task is critical due to the disproportionate impact of climate change and other environmental issues on minority communities. NOAA, NSF and other agencies and foundations have programs targeted to engage students of diverse backgrounds into STEM and environmental fields related to the oceans and coasts. We will hear from students and program managers involved in these programs, consider lessons learned and discuss how to scale up to substantially diversify the marine and coastal professions.

Background:

The multitude of resources and ecosystem services within our oceans and coastal areas makes management a challenging task. With this plethora of resources comes a diverse portfolio of stakeholders who are involved in coastal and ocean management. This diversity includes persons of varying disciplinary, cultural, ethnic and national backgrounds.

It is important to ensure that diverse public perspectives are involved in a meaningful way in marine and coastal planning. This is particularly important for underserved communities, which are disproportionately affected by environmental degradation, including the effects of climate change. By 2050, ethnic minorities are expected to make up more than 50% of the United States population. Thus consideration of environmental impacts upon these populations is a national priority(Cutter and Emrich 2006, Pollard and Mather 2008).

Outcomes:

Resulting student recommendations will:

• Articulate the importance of and mechanisms for continued diversification of leaders to manage our changing oceans and coasts effectively.
  
• Characterize coastal and ocean adaptation strategies grounded in research related to public health, climate justice, and other issues relevant to coastal and marine spatial planning
  
• Identify opportunities for including experiences of underserved communities in developing coastal and ocean adaptation strategies such as coastal and marine spatial planning in response to climate change.
  

Resulting Recommendations:

DRAFT  RECOMMENDATIONS – Prepared by breakout groups and subject to review. These recommendations are the result of group processes and do not necessarily represent that positions of NCSE, which served as the enabler of the process that generated the recommendations.
DRAFT  RECOMMENDATIONS – Prepared by breakout groups and subject to review. These recommendations are the result of group processes and do not necessarily represent that positions of NCSE, which served as the enabler of the process that generated the recommendations.

Task 1.  Short term (1-5 years)-Educational institutions should create mentoring programs and effectively match students to resources that bridge the gap between capability and successful careers in leadership positions.

Task 2. Short term (1-5 years)-Educational Institutions (from K-grad) should create access to programs to teach minority students how to successfully write grant proposals.

Task 3.  Short term (1-5 years) - Educational institutions should increase professional development programs for underrepresented groups.

Task 4.  Short term (1-5 years) - Create an interagency working group for coordination between and promotion of diversity programs.

Task 5. Short term (1-5 years) - Community groups, educational institutions, churches, private sector groups should increase distribution of information on diversity programs.

Task 6.  Short term (1-5 years)- Federal agencies, private sector industry and NGO’s should create public relations imagery and a PSA for the mainstream public that gives insight to the importance of diversity within ocean and coastal science.

Task 7. Long term (5-10 years)- Federal agencies should invest more time and resources into co-locating national labs at minority-serving institutions (MSIs)/ historically black colleges and universities (HBCU’s) and vice versa collocating at all institutions.

Task 8. Long term (5-10 years)- NCSE should create a working advisory group which mentors diversity programs that are spearheaded by communities groups such other nonprofits, corporations, faith-based, mainstream environmental groups.