NOAA 2004-R986
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Aja Sea-Kung
8/18/04

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration granted more than $1.7 million to the Environmental Careers Organization to provide work experience to college graduates at NOAA’s National Ocean Service. NOAA is an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The grant will finance a program at NOAA’s Ocean Service to provide professional training to recent college graduates. Training will include many varied and unique assignments such as; working with navigation response teams in the field; working with electronic navigational charts, hydrographic surveying, and maritime boundaries; and working with the Coastal and Ocean Resource Economics Program to provide socioeconomic information and analyses to many NOAA program offices and state and local government agencies that manage coastal and ocean resources. In addition, the graduates will be working on-site within the Guam Division of Aquatic & Wildlife Resources, assisting with multi-agency coral reef monitoring efforts, assisting in the analysis of satellite imagery for monitoring of algal blooms, testing and evaluating Autonomous Underwater Vehicles and Remotely Operated Vehicles, and developing hydrodynamic models for real world applications.

“College graduates will gain valuable experience from working closely with NOAA employees everyday, and will hopefully gain interest in joining the NOAA team,” said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “NOAA and the Bush Administration are working to improve the understanding of our environment and to strengthen local and regional initiatives like the Environmental Careers Organization.”

Each year, NOAA awards approximately $900 million in grants to members of the academic, scientific and business communities to assist the agency in fulfilling its mission to study the Earth’s natural systems in order to predict environmental change, manage ocean resources, protect life and property, and provide decision makers with reliable scientific information. NOAA’s goals and programs reflect a commitment to these basic responsibilities of science and service to the nation for the past 34 years.

NOAA is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of our nation’s coastal and marine resources. To learn more about NOAA, please visit http://www.noaa.gov.

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