22 
THE CORAL TRIANGLE: HEARST BIODIVERSITY EXPEDITION 
Natural history museums tend to be siloed institutions. Their research and collections func¬ 
tions are often not well integrated with the public engagement and education areas. For a view of 
the silo effect, go to any natural history museum’s website and navigate from area to area. Even 
within major sub-units, Web pages will have different appearances and different approaches. Great 
content exists on websites, but it is frequently buried and not organized in a visitor-centric manner. 
While scientists may be asked to participate in exhibit development or public or donor events, there 
is insufficient attention given to designing programs that — from their inception — are intended to 
integrate the science and the public engagement and maximize the synergy that can be derived from 
teams with different perspectives working jointly to achieve common goals. 
The 2011 expedition was an opportunity for the Academy to create a new model for planning 
broadly, inclusively, and collaboratively from inception to implementation. If successful, this 
approach would help us achieve gi'eater institutional relevance by more effectively integrating cur¬ 
rent scientific findings and impacts into public programs and educational materials, with the sci¬ 
ence and impacts themselves actually becoming the hook that captures the public’s interest and 
engages them. 
Planning the Expedition 
It’s rare when one’s executive director walks into a room full of scientists, announces that two 
generous donors want to fund an expedition, and asks “Where would you like to go?” In March 
2010, the donors, Will and Margaret Hearst, recognized the importance and power of the Acade¬ 
my’s research in such sites as the Galapagos Islands in 1905-1906 (California Academy of Sci¬ 
ences 1907), and felt the time was ripe for another large, multi-disciplinaiy expedition. Research 
curators had approximately six weeks to prepare competitive proposals. The size of the gift allowed 
the scientists to think large-scale and take a team approach. The mission of the Academy and its 
scientific research, as well as the realities of doing field research these days, set some parameters: 
The expedition would focus on documenting biodiversity in a biological “hot spot” facing serious 
threats (Meyers, Mittermeier, Mittenneier, da Fonseca, and Kent 2000). And, given the extensive 
work and collaborations required to secure the necessary permits and organize logistical support 
within a year, the site should be one in which the Academy already had well-established contacts 
and in-country partnerships. 
Thi'ee proposals were submitted: biological diversity of Sao Tome and Principe, ant diversity 
in the Seychelles, and marine and terrestrial diversity in the Philippines. The Philippines project 
was chosen due to its larger scope, scale, and multi-disciplinarity, as well as the fact that the nec- 
essaiy collaboration infrastructure between the Academy and the host country already existed. This 
would become the largest and most diverse expedition in the Academy’s 159-year history of explo¬ 
ration — and the largest and most heralded expedition of its kind ever mounted in the Philippines. 
The first author of this article was the Principal hivestigator, overall leader of the expedition, and 
leader of the shallow-water research component. The second author was a Co-PI on the proposal, 
and leader of the educational outreach component. 
The Lead-up to the Expedition 
The Academy began working in the Philippines in the early twentieth century. The Philippines 
became a U.S. colony at the end of the Spanish American war in 1898, and early exploration of the 
new lands was a priority for the United States. The U.S. Fish and Fisheries Commission sent the 
steamer Albatross to explore the waters surrounding the Philippines in 1907-1910. Many new 
species of fishes, represented in a multitude of specimens, were collected during the expedition. 
