1998 Year of the Ocean Marine Science, Technology, and Research 



"science as process," with students learning observational, inferential, and experimental 

 techniques. Rather, an increased emphasis is being placed upon a system that emphasizes inquiry 

 as central to science education. 



A CALL TO ACTION 



A broad thematic approach to the role of ocean science and technology should be 

 undertaken, invoking themes of a nature highly relevant to society's needs. Four themes 

 associated with national interests — identified in the CORE publication Oceans 2000: Bridging 

 the Millennia, and echoed as themes and issues by the U.S. Year-of-the-Ocean Working 

 Group— are listed below and broadly defined as indicated: 



1 . National Security. Ensuring that national interests are guaranteed at home and abroad 

 and that basic and applied ocean science remains an essential element of this 

 assurance. This category is meant to include issues associated with preservation of 

 national interests, via military defense, and foreign policy support. 



2. Sustainable Economic Development. Use of the basic and applied knowledge of the 

 ocean and its resources for economic gain, including attention to marine resources, 

 transportation, recreation, development, and related industries. 



3. Quality of Life. Health and social well-being of people as derived from using basic 

 and applied knowledge of the ocean. Subject material includes the topics of 

 preservation/improvement/ stewardship of the environment (pollution prevention, 

 marine protection, cleanup and remediation), shoreline protection, coastal hazard 

 mitigation, and recreation. 



4. Communication/Education. Conveying an understanding of the importance of the 

 ocean to national decision making, to the public at large, and to decision makers and 

 educators at every level using basic and applied knowledge of the ocean, to include 

 the exploitation of state-of-the-art electronic networking and computer based 

 simulations/ demonstrations. 



In essence, the set of issues which the oceanographic community is bracing to address are 

 enormous when considered by any dimension — ^the volume of data, the geographic breadth of 

 impact, the range of disciplines, the variety of assets, and the physical challenges. A 

 characteristic issue faced by this small but diverse community of scientists is that the expertise is 

 distributed throughout the nation. The breadth of skills required in oceanography, coupled with 

 the relatively small number of skilled practitioners translates to a thin, but wide distribution of 

 capabilities. The situation might be compared to having a different medical specialist located at 

 each hospital throughout the country, i.e., all of the necessary skills are at hand, but they are 

 widely distributed. This condition is dramatically compounded by the high level of sophistication 

 and multiple, costly platforms needed to make measurements or predictions in the ocean 

 environment. Many of the major resources (people, equipment, platforms) are one-of-a-kind. 



1-8 



