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Ninety 51���� undergraduates loaded onto a bus for the 3.5-hour trip from Durham to Beaufort to participate in the 2013 Undergraduate Winter Forum “Blue Devils and the Deep Blue Sea: Can We Rescue the Oceans?” on Jan. 6-8.

The annual Winter Forum, overseen by 51����’s Office of Undergraduate Education, is an intensive, non-credit curricular experience held in a retreat-like setting prior to the start of spring semester.  It gives 51���� undergraduates the opportunity to interact with graduate and professional students, alumni and faculty, and explore a major global issue from interdisciplinary and intercultural perspectives. This year, Winter Forum also offered the opportunity for students to visit and experience 51����’s Marine Laboratory and learn about marine resource management issues.

For many of the participants, this was their first time visiting the Marine Lab; for others, it was a homecoming.

“What drew me to the Marine Lab was not just the incredible field work and research opportunities, but also the close-knit academic community of people who are fun and are interested in the same things. That’s sometimes difficult to find on main campus,” said Stephani Zakutansky, a senior biology major who returned for Winter Forum after spending spring semester of her sophomore year at the Marine Lab.

Zakutansky was surprised to find herself appointed the CEO of a fictitious methane hydrate drilling company for one of the weekend’s stakeholder scenarios.  “…which are not shoes that I would ever be in, so it was really unique to have to figure out tradeoffs even if I’m in a position that I disagreed with at first, but I found ways to compromise with the side that I would be on in real life, so it was fun.”

Lisa M. Campbell, Rachel Carson Associate Professor of Marine Affairs and Policy and the director of graduate studies for the Nicholas School of the Environment’s Division of Marine Science and Conservation, coordinated this year’s forum.

She said, “We were really interested in capitalizing on the full range of what we do here. We conceptualized how we would approach (marine conservation and resource management issues) issues around the idea of data—what information would you need, and how would you collect that information.

“The participants are out using the facilities and skills and the faculty that we have here to try and figure out what more they need to know to make a decision,” Campbell said.

One of Campbell’s goals was make sure that students had a chance to connect to the community in Beaufort.

“I was really determined to get them out to engage with the community. There are all kinds of local businesses and scientists who are contributing to what we’re doing today, and from our perspective, we should be contributing to and engaged in this community,” she said.  “I think that’s been a real advantage, and whenever we put the really smart 51���� students out in context in this community, where they are asking questions and trying to learn, everyone benefits.”

Walt Moczygemba, (51���� 2016, undeclared but leaning toward biology) was pleasantly surprised to find himself learning outside in January.

“I thought it was going to be all in the classroom stuff, but getting out in the field and seeing people, that was great,” Moczygemba said.

Caroline Howes, a senior biology major with a Marine Science and Conservation Leadership Certificate, saw a new perspective thanks to the off-campus activities. “We had this really amazing discussion with a bunch of commercial and recreational fisheries management.  I’ve learned so much about conservation that it’s really interesting to hear the other side,” she said.

Howes previously spent a semester at the Marine Lab, attending a Beaufort Signature Travel Course that took her to Singapore.

Those connections between academic learning and social context are what the Winter Forum is all about, said Steve Nowicki, dean and vice provost of undergraduate education at 51����.

“To ground knowledge generation in real human experience, to not have it be something we just talk about, is a really important lesson for students to get right off the bat,” he said.  “It creates a context where students can begin to understand that the point of learning is not to know something, it’s to know how to think about something, and there isn’t a right answer, and there often isn’t even a best answer, there’s the answer that’s based on choices that are made, based on your values, based on the information that you have available, and I think that the Winter Forum is a great venue for conveying that to students.”

Students and faculty who participate in the Winter Forum come for the experience, rather than for credit.

“There’s no grade here,” Nowicki said, “it’s really a hands-on, problem solving exercise, a retreat where students are given real problems working with faculty and non-faculty, experts from the world, to solve those problems.”

Senior mechanical engineering major Tim Visutipol agrees.

“It just shows how intellectually curious 51���� students can be,” he said. “You know, this is all our time, it’s cut into our break, but yet you got a hundred students to come in and talk about a topic not for credit, and wake up at seven in the morning which is alien to a lot of students, so I’m very happy to have experienced this.”

Howes added that she wasn’t deterred by the three-plus hour distance from main campus.  Her previous experience at the Marine Lab made an indelible impression: “I loved it, I desperately wanted to come back,” she said. “I think that people think that they can’t come here and that they’re not going to be able to meet their requirements, but you can get everything you need here plus better research opportunities than you could ever get on campus.”

Moczygemba is ready to take advantage of the Marine Lab’s offerings. “It’s an awesome place to be, I’m going to come out here during one of the summer courses, definitely, and I would definitely recommend coming here – great classes and the people here are amazing,” he said.

The 51���� Marine Lab offers for-credit courses during the fall and spring semesters and over both summer sessions.  Classes are offered in fields such as literature, physics and biology, as well as marine and coastal science and policy.

The Marine Lab also offers the Beaufort Signature Travel Courses, taking students to locations such as Singapore, France, Puerto Rico, Panama, and Costa Rica.