2020 - St. Lawrence
Description
The Great Journey
Project Lead : Jocelyn Whalen and Emily Shier
Project Description
The Great Journey is an educational book about salmon migration in Canada. It is written by Jocelyn Whalen, illustrated by Emily Shier and published by Ocean Wise. The Great Journey was written to educate the public about salmon migration in Canada and human influences.
What was your biggest challenge?
Emily: Biggest challenge was pulling the book together and keeping momentum going to create a final product. However, we had biweekly check-ins beyond simply meeting with our mentor but with each other to keep each other on track. The other challenge is to distribute the books, which we are currently doing by having a book launch and contacting local libraries etc.
Jocelyn: I had the idea to create this book around four years ago but I didn't know how. Ocean Wise made it happen and I'm so grateful for their support.
What was your most valuable take away?
Emily: My most valuable take away is that you can do anything you put your mind to and succeed. You are enough. When I entered the Ocean Bridge program I had really low self-esteem and I didn't think that I could complete a single project, but I connected with Jocelyn and made a ton of friends, and now have illustrated a book.
Jocelyn: Community service projects are the best! Community is so important and there so many wonderful and supportive people in the world. You can literally do anything you put your mind to. Nothing is unattainable.
Status
Our project is complete, but we welcome current cohort members to help distribute hard and e-copies of the book and use it for educational purposes.
Marine Melodies Online Concert
Project Lead : Sam Dimitraki
Project Description
Sam Dimitraki, Arianne Laboissonière, and I put on Bilingual Ocean-themed virtual concert featuring a variety of Montreal/Quebec based musicians playing original ocean themed songs - many of which were written specifically for this concert. We also included clips showcasing the projects of other Ocean bridge participants. My personal project was to write 3 (3.5 if you count our outro song!) educational ocean-themed songs which I performed live during this concert with my friend and talented multi-instrumentalist, Jenny Rizzo.
What was your biggest challenge?
t was difficult to plan the filming with the constant changes in COVID safety regulations, and to coordinate with our 3 busy schedules, but we were lucky in that we were pretty in sync in terms of what we each were working towards. Personally I would say that I struggled the most working on the lyrics to my song Cee Cee Turtle ! Self-doubt is also a big struggle, I was very worried that the songs I was writing wouldn't be worth the price tag - or in any case, my ability to perform them.
What was your most valuable take away?
To me, a big takeaway was how valuable it is to have a team, and cheerleader on your side - I think this is really a strength of the Ocean Bridge program. I'm someone who can't always be trusted to believe fully in the worth of what they're doing, and I can be a perfectionist - which can mean that projects don't always get completed, or I that I don't allow myself to dream big enough.
Status
This project is complete in the sense that the concert is in the can! My long-term goal is to write a handful more of these songs and then record them and release them. Maybe even see about performing them at a school or library in tandem with other ocean themed programming!
Sustainable Lunch Bags For Local Orphanage
Project Lead : Sophie Cervera
Project Description
Plastic pollution has been rampant and most of it go to our oceans, affecting our marine life and habitat. The global initiative of reducing plastic pollution, such as shoreline pickups and volunteering has been great thus far. Through my project, I would like to add to the collective effort of reducing single-use plastics and plastic waste in our daily lives. My project is to promote sustainability to our youth in a local orphanage by distributing lunch bags which includes reusable items such as food container, water bottle, face mask, spork, etc. Along with these, are crayons and USBs containing fun activities, such as printable colouring pages, fun facts relating to the ocean and resources about COVID & mental health from the local health services. My goal is to extend ocean literacy & conservation and sustainability through lunch bags in a safe space to vulnerable youth and hopefully some of them would also join Ocean Bridge in the future.
What was your biggest challenge?
The biggest challenge would be the pandemic. It was hard to find an orphanage that would be willing to accept my project since most of them are closed or that they weren't accepting any donations at the moment. Thankfully, I found one and I assured them that the items are new and would be fully sanitized when packaged.
What was your most valuable take away?
Doing the project has taught me kindness and people's willingness to help out and support a good cause. An Etsy shop, where I bought the masks, gave me extra masks when I told them about my project. A friend of mine gave me discount at the store where I bought some of the items for my project. These brought down the overall cost and left me with some budget to buy other supplies, such as band-aids. In arriving Brenda's House, the orphanage, they were very accommodating, despite the heavy snow that day. The project distribution was shared in their social media promoting Ocean Wise, for people to check out the organization and its work.
Continue to Ocean Bridge 2022 - Application and Program Details »
