0:00:00.0 John Sheehan: NOAA's Teacher at Sea Program since 1990 has sent more than 850 educators to sail aboard science vessels, to monitor fisheries and ocean trends and to return to their classrooms with firsthand experience of what it's like to live and work at sea.

0:00:16.8 Roy Arezzo: I think it's a powerful tool as a teacher to have this experience. These professional developments give you tremendous street credit in your classroom.

0:00:25.1 JS: And the program, which is about to celebrate its 35th anniversary doesn't stop there, with resources and an alumni network that continues to provide support to educators. This is Dive In With NOAA Fisheries. I'm John Sheehan. And today, as educators across the country are returning to classrooms, we'll meet one teacher at sea who's returning to the program after participating in 2007.

0:00:49.5 RA: My name is Roy Arezzo. I am the Teacher at Sea Alumni Association, NOAA Fellow for the year 2024 and '25.

0:01:00.6 JS: Roy, born and raised in Brooklyn, just recently retired.

0:01:03.3 RA: And if this was a video, there'd be air quotes around retire.

0:01:07.1 JS: His love of field work and a passion for aquaculture and the waterways of New York made him a natural fit for the fellowship and the Teacher at Sea Program.

0:01:14.7 RA: So I really fell in love with teaching early on, right outta college and primarily was a biology teacher in New York City. I worked in a middle school. We created a community garden that's still standing today and we did a school-wide compost program.

0:01:29.3 JS: Back then, he introduced his students to a program called Trout in the Classroom, where fish are grown indoors and then released into the wild.

0:01:36.9 RA: It brought my students into the field to release their trout upstate and understand the connection between upstate and downstate and where our drinking water comes from and the value of water quality, which was more important than growing the fish.

0:01:51.6 JS: And it led Roy to start focusing on that kind of work. He began teaching at City-As-School, an Alternative high school in New York. And around that time started getting really into oysters.

0:02:02.4 RA: And I had oyster reefs rolling around in my head how New York City was sort of built on oyster reefs and the value of them both for the ecosystem, for economy, and for local people. And all the cool history around both the rich and poor eating the same food. And I thought about what it would be like to bring reefs back.

0:02:26.8 JS: So he pitched an idea to an organization called the Bronx River Alliance.

0:02:30.7 RA: And I wanted to start oyster reefs. I didn't think they would follow up, but I guess I had signed up for getting oysters. I was told I was getting about 10,000 oysters, small oysters to grow, and collect data on. It sounded like a big project. It was a far road away from building reefs, but getting oysters in the water was a good start in New York City. I didn't think I could do it alone, so I changed the field class to be centered around this oyster gardening project and I called it River Lab.

0:03:09.1 JS: And it was this project that led him to the Urban Assembly, New York Harbor School, which opened in 2003. It's a public high school that combines traditional academics with technical education for college prep built on maritime experience. Roy helped start the school and was on its planning committee and while there he taught biology, started an AP environmental science course, and really developed a love of aquaculture.

0:03:32.6 RA: And for seven years I was focused on fisheries and aquaculture, mostly culturing with students, microalgae, finfish, ornamental fish, and later experimenting with aquaponics.

0:03:49.7 JS: Your career clearly has this sort of mix of field work of biology, environmental science with a focus on stewardship and really connecting students with their surroundings and in particular with sort of their waterways. Teacher at Sea came around for you in 2007 in what sounds like sort of the middle of your sort of trajectory as an educator. Can you describe sort of how that came about, and why you wanted to do it?

0:04:22.4 RA: One of the things I realized early on is that to teach at a high level and spend your whole career in a tough urban environment, I really needed to find new professional developments that helped sharpen my skills, but also gave me sort of a experience that was refreshing for me personally. So when I read the description of the Teacher at Sea program, I was so excited and I'm like, I have to do this. Fortunately, it's a competitive program. I was awarded a spot my first go around in 2007, and I was really excited to be at sea. I loved being on boats. I was matched up with the Oscar Dyson, and it took me as far away from New York City as I can get and still in the United States, 'cause I went all the way west and north to the Aleutian chain in Alaska to get on a Bering Sea outta Dutch Harbor. And I worked with their echo integration survey, studying Pollock populations. It's an important fishery and it was great to be understanding the population dynamics and be surrounded by scientists who were trying to make this fishery more sustainable. For me, it was about understanding food systems better. Students eat every day, so I was excited to really be surrounded by people that understood fisheries.

0:06:00.9 JS: That's interesting. And so, but the food system part of it was big for you?

0:06:05.8 RA: Yes, I had an interest not only because I worked at a maritime school and taught marine science, but also from books I've read about fisheries, the impact of oysters on New York City and COD on the history of shipping. And if I had to go all the way back, my grandmother raised rabbits and was very frugal about spending money in the grocery store and tried to grow as much food in the city as she could, and both my mother and I were big fans of gardening because of that. And so I've always been interested in not just food 'cause I love to eat like everyone else, but how it's grown, how it's distributed, where it comes from. When I taught environmental science, it was a excellent way to connect students to science lessons, because everybody could relate to like, oh, I eat this, I love this, where does it come from? And then next thing you know you're tricking them into learning science. Because of my experience at Teacher at Sea, it really made me a strong aquaculture teacher despite not having industry experience in aquaculture.

0:07:19.0 JS: You've described the Teacher at Sea program as pivotal, is that sort of what you're talking about? Did it change your perspective on sort of how you wanted to approach teaching?

0:07:27.1 RA: It enriched my perspective. It gave me a toolbox that I didn't have with access to data. NOAA has amazing educational resources and all this data is public. And when I realized what was out there as a resource as a teacher, it really enhanced my teaching and I was able to bring students not only the lessons that I had prepared, but also connect them to actual research that was going on. It connected students to global systems as well.

0:08:04.9 JS: Yeah. A little more on Teacher at Sea. Did the experience of it match your expectations of sort of what you would get from the program, or did you come away with it feeling like, oh my gosh, I hadn't even considered X, Y, or Z?

0:08:18.8 RA: Far exceeded my expectations. First of all, being at sea, working with the crew is a powerful team building experience that translates well into managing a classroom and being out in the field with students on any given vessel on any given day. There's multiple projects going on 24/7, so I would have a 12 hour shift and then spend some time when I wasn't sleeping or eating on other projects, looking at birds, marine mammals. Whatever was happening, I tried to insert myself. If I could help, great. If I needed to stay out of the way, that was great, but I knew I can bring more back to my classroom by getting to know all the career implications and different projects that were going on and the different roles of the crew. So interviewing people, Teacher at Sea is a blog that I recommend people take a look at. Of each teacher that's at sea, my blog is still up. People can read my blog.

0:09:26.3 JS: And it's very detailed. There are copious notes in that blog. It's fascinating.

0:09:32.4 RA: Well, there's data, there's observations, there's experiences, there's stories, but the career implications is also super powerful because most students in New York City, even if they're at a school like Harbor School, don't imagine themselves on the Bering Sea, but it turns out they're getting skills that would help them get a job in this type of setting. And it's, if they're willing to travel, and interested to be somewhere, else there's lab techs on the boat. So I interviewed everybody for the sake of journaling, but also I was glad I had to interview everybody. I was like, really wanted to hear their story the way you're listening to my story. NOAA has some impressive people working for them. So it was a tremendous experience and it made me a better teacher overall.

0:10:19.9 JS: That's really cool. Did experiencing like large scale federal sustainability practices specifically fishery management, like did that change your perspective at all on some of the sort of like more local sustainability work that you had sort of already been doing in New York?

0:10:38.2 RA: Well, it legitimized the work that needs to be done for us to start respecting the planet a little better. It's great to see NOAA investing these resources in protecting a fish that most people haven't even heard of, but they've probably eaten.

0:10:54.2 JS: And you said many times. Now, you love getting out on boats and you love getting out on the sea and how you really appreciated that you could bring this experience back to your students back in New York who could never imagine being out there. But you have stayed in New York your whole career.

0:11:15.2 RA: It's been my anecdotal observation that there's not a lot of 30 year plus science teachers around New York City, especially in small schools. And I really connected with the students that grew up here, and I feel like there was always work to do that seemed important in my mind and the students kind of fueled that importance by engaging and being interested. And there's plenty of beautiful environment in New York City. The waterways in New York City is the only real wilderness left. For people who don't know, New York City has a pretty complicated estuary system that's highly influenced and connects all the boroughs of New York City. It's important to the history of New York City, and it's important to the future of New York City in the face of climate change. So the more the students know about the water, the better.

0:12:06.8 JS: And so let's talk a little bit about your next chapter. What does it mean to be a Teacher at Sea fellow? Is it outreach? Is it sort of consulting on curriculum? Is it are you going to schools, and sort of sharing expertise?

0:12:24.3 RA: So the Teacher at Sea Fellowship is a very flexible job that encompasses all the things you just said, which is really exciting. It's consulting for NOAA, and helping update some of their educational resources. Along with that is to work with the alumni that have been through Teacher at Sea. Teacher at Sea is about to celebrate a 35th year anniversary, which is really exciting, so it's an amazing program. But then, the last third of the job is to develop individual projects, which I am now researching around bringing aquaculture into more classrooms.

0:13:06.7 JS: I wanna close with I think one of the big through lines to your career. It seems like oysters have played a big role and I'm wondering what your favorite part about either teaching or working with oysters is, because there's sort of this historical component there, like not just traditional to New York, they're sort of, they're like a foundational species that you said, but they're also such a big part of the food system, and they're so good for the water quality of the area and they're delicious. I love oysters. I'm wondering what connects for you.

0:13:43.1 RA: A lot of people know that coral reefs are really important. Oyster reefs have all the benefits of a coral reef on most of them. They happen outside of tropical areas. And in addition to being delicious, they also happen to be one of the most sustainable proteins you can grow on the planet. They require no pesticides, fertilizers, they filter algae which in most ecosystems, especially around the East coast, there's too much of. And I guess when I read some books on oysters, I was sort of inspired to see where I could involve students in restoration work or improving the water quality through growing oysters. I didn't know when I read those books and I thought about this that I would get really involved in a school that embraced, that is kind of one of the core introductory courses to all the students at Harbor School. And so it's more serendipity than it is. I had this great idea, it was more things just fell into place, and it connected well with local ecology and global food systems and sustainability.

0:15:15.2 JS: Well, Roy Arezzo, thanks so much for talking with me.

0:15:17.5 RA: Thanks for your time. It was great to be here and excited to be involved in all these initiatives.

0:15:22.2 JS: Roy Arezzo is a retired New York City educator. Most recently, he taught at the Urban Assembly New York Harbor School. The school is also where he contributed to the nonprofit Billion Oyster Project, which was created by two Harbor School staffers.

0:15:36.3 RA: The Billion Oyster Project, its main focus is restoration through education. And they do that on many levels, including working with schools to put oysters in the water and learn from them, as well as working with local agencies, getting permits, something I as a teacher was too ambitious to really for me to get my head around, but able to put actual reef structures in the water to restore our local waterways and help improve water quality and protect our shorelines a little.

0:16:10.5 JS: I told you, this guy loves oysters. You can find more about Roy and his work with NOAA's teacher at Sea program at our website, fisheries.noaa.gov, where you can find other back to school resources. So long summer, it was nice while it lasted. I'm John Sheehan and this has been Dive In With NOAA Fisheries.