SEA GRANT COLLEGES 95 



SEA-GRANT UNIVERSITIES: PROBLEMS OF IMPLEMENTATION 



(A Panel Discussion) 



Robert B. Abel, MEA, George Washington University, 1961. Since 

 1961, he has been the Executive Secretary, Interagency Committee 

 on Oceanography, and the Assistant Research Coordinator, Office of 

 Naval Research. For five years he was chief scientist aboard two 

 ships of the U. S. Naval Oceanographic Office. 



It has been a good five years that our program (ICO) has been in existence. 

 There have been some very significant research accomplishments in all aspects 

 of oceanography, in marine biology, marine meteorology and in the air/sea in- 

 teraction, submarine geology, geochemistry, the elucidation of current circula- 

 tion. There's been some very exciting research accomplished. Incidentally, it 

 is hoped that we will be able to document the results of these research projects, 

 and issue them in some kind of compiled report form by early next year to pro- 

 vide a compendium of what has been going on recently in oceanography. Probably 

 equally important, there has been a rather sizeable investment in building up 

 our potential ability to take advantage of new research accomplishments as they 

 occur. This investment is exemplified in ships, laboratories, and (certainly, at 

 least as important as the rest), in student populations in the various universities 

 in the country. So I repeat, it has been a rather good five years, good enough to 

 whet our appetites for considerably more progress in the next five. 



One thing that struck me about the proceedings yesterday was the concerted 

 drive to carve up Senator Pell's poor little chicken before it has even emerged 

 from the shell. 



I would hope that instead we can concentrate on what it is we're trying to 

 do, what is in this for the people of the United States, how we're going to attain 

 our goals. Hopefully, stemming from this conference, there can emerge some 

 rather substantive ideas. Ideas should be generated within the states, them- 

 selves. First of all, we need ideas to strengthen the quality of Senator Pell's 

 bill. After all he did leave us with this request yesterday, that support is needed 

 and needed from many sectors of the scientific spectrum. Secondly, we might 

 consider for awhile what must be at least one of the principal objects of our at- 

 tention and that is the student, the ocean engineering student. Consider if you 

 will what we plan to do to this student. We're going to immerse him in engi- 

 neering. We will flavor this immersion with some law, and with some home 

 economics; we will push him part way through a sanitation laboratory, and all 

 the time we are doing this, we are also implementing what someone asked for 

 yesterday --that the sea-grant college be a sea-going college. So we're going to 

 send this student out. He's going to spend considerable time at sea if he's a 

 worthwhile student, and this will, of course, prolong his stay at school, four, 

 five, six, perhaps seven years. This is the history of oceanography, as you well 

 know. Now, what's he doing all that time? He's certainly prevented from hold- 

 ing down a conventional job ashore. In his shore hours, he cannot normally be 

 an assistant because as you know, there are almost no undergraduate depart- 

 ments in oceanography where he can help students, and so he must have unique 

 sources of income available to him. Now, all this time that he has prolonged his 

 education, he has been raising a family, and this simply adds to his financial 

 discomfort. That is why, you see, this concept of sea- grant support is particu- 

 larly precious to me, I believe there is going to be a lot of work in it from the 

 point of view of the student. 



Finally, there is an international kick to all this. Someone yesterday men- 

 tioned the possibility of training foreign students. Possibly some of you are 

 better acquainted with facilities in other countries. I don't know myself of any 



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