Marine Education Center
Coastal Explorer
In this unique three-hour field trip program, teachers choose from eight exciting
topics to create their own rich marine education experience. The field trip begins
at our state-of-the-art facility at the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory's Cedar Point
location. The 100-acre site on Davis Bayou in Ocean Springs, Mississippi, features
indoor and outdoor classrooms, laboratories, habitat trails and floating classrooms
in a coastal setting. Program fees begin at $12 per participant. Owl Pellet dissections
add $5 lab fee per participant. Shark and fish dissections add $10 lab fee each per
participant.
Contact us at 228.818.8095 or marine.educationFREEMississippi today to book your trip!
Choose three from the eight marine education modules below to create your custom three-hour field trip.
Students learn about box turtles, terrapins, alligators and non-venomous snakes of
South Mississippi. Students get to touch and hold our live specimens, lab specimens
and artifacts in the classroom laboratory and learn how humans impact local wildlife.
Educators start with the classification of cold-blooded reptiles and teach what physical
characteristics distinguish crocodiles from alligators and sea turtles from tortoises.
Participants gain knowledge about snake biology and learn the differences between
non-venomous and venomous snakes.
When the MEC team began their journey to create a "best-in-class" marine education
center, professionals surveyed the entire area on Davis Bayou cataloging trees, habitats,
and resident animal populations. The site features tidal marshes, maritime forests,
coastal bayous and a forested Bayhead. Participants head out to the trails to visit
the unique habitats, observing varieties of plants, birds, and other animals, learning
techniques and characteristics to distinguish one habitat from another.
Students walk to one of the bayou access points on the site to collect water samples
and perform water quality measurements. In the laboratory, they apply chemical methods
for measuring salinity, dissolved oxygen, pH, and temperature. Students gain an understanding
of how water quality changes with the seasons, and its vast impact on coastal wildlife.
Educators teach about expanding dead zones, algae blooms and how upstream fertilizer
runoff and other pollutants impact the water quality in the Gulf of Mexico.
USM researchers are leaders in the field of cultivating copepods critical for feeding
newly hatched fry in aquaculture systems. Students begin the session with a walk to
the bayou and pulling a net to collect plankton. Returning to the laboratory classroom,
students examine their collected specimens under microscopes, identifying copepods,
zooplankton, phytoplankton, holoplankton, and meroplankton. Participants gain an understanding
of the importance of plankton in the food web and how variations in populations can
impact the food chain in a coastal environmental system.
Marine educators created a dichotomous key featuring local species to teach about
taxonomy and classification and to help students learn the techniques to distinguish
organisms. Educators demonstrate observation and identification techniques to aid
in the critical thinking process to identify and evaluate morphological differences
of fish, crabs, clams, snails and other organisms to their taxonomic level.
Students engage in a learning adventure studying coastal birds of prey including osprey,
swallow-tailed kite, bald eagles and owls, their nesting and hunting habits and ecological
specialization.Students work in pairs to dissect a preserved owl pellet to understand the unique digestion system of owls and their diet.
Learn why sharks are apex predators and what our research scientists are learning
in ongoing USM GCRL shark research in the Gulf of Mexico. Students work in small teams
to dissect a shark specimen to gain an understanding of internal and external shark
anatomy. Marine educators explain the seven senses of sharks, what's unique about
their digestive system, and how they have evolved over millions of years.
Students work in groups of two to dissect a fish specimen to learn first-hand about
internal and external fish anatomy. Educators explore scale type, digestive and respiratory
systems and ecological adaptations such as fin shape and caudle peduncle. Students
remove otoliths (fish ear bones) and learn how fisheries research scientists analyze
the otoliths to chart fish age and growth rates all over the world.
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