News Taffy

Dr. Paul Sikkel, Marine Biology, has been working to help children understand the importance of coral reef research. What began as a class field trip to Puerto Rico in 2007 has developed into a continuing relationship between Sikkel, the non-profit CORALations, and an ecology charter school, Escuela Ecologica, on the island of Culebra. For the past three years, Sikkel has taken a group of college students to Culebra, where they have demonstrated collecting and laboratory techniques and taught the local students about the relationship between parasites and their reef-fish hosts. Sikkel designed a module for the school on parasite-host interactions with materials funded by the Puerto Rican Department of Education.

Students and teachers at Escuela Ecologica monitor the coral reefs and collect samples. Sikkel returns to Culebra twice a year to help them collect and analyze their data. At ASU, Sikkel is eager to recruit students for his study of coral reefs around Culebra and the Virgin Islands. He also hopes to find ASU students interested in mentoring the young students at Escuela Ecologica. Engaging ASU students in this type of work, Sikkel believes, will benefit them now and in the future by exposing them to coral reefs, the richest, most diverse habitats in the world, and by exposing them to different cultures.

See recent CORALations photographs. Rights reserved to Coralations 2010. See more of the story at asu.edu.