Alumni

URI GSO Professor Robert Ballard has been in the news frequently in association with the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic. On April 19, at 7 p.m., he will be giving a free lecture at the Ryan Center on the Kingston Campus of URI. Details are at this link.

The URI GSO hockey team, the Bay Blades, retained possession of the coveted Niskin Cup trophy by winning both games of the 31st annual Niskin Cup Tournament.

The Inner Space Center at the URI Graduate School of Oceanography is featured in "New Frontiers in Ocean Exploration: The E/V Nautilus and NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer 2011 Field Season," a supplement to the March 2012 issue of Oceanography, the official magazine of the Oceanography Society.

The American Association of School Administrators has announced that Dr. Robert Ballard is the 2012 recipient of the American Education Award. This award honors an outstanding American citizen who has achieved excellence and distinction in his or her career and serves as a role model and teacher to others.

Dr. James A. Yoder, M.S. Oceanography URI 1974, Ph.D. Oceanography URI 1979, has been named a fellow of The Oceanography Society "for his innovative and visionary application of satellite ocean color technologies to interdisciplinary oceanography and his extraordinary service to oceanography."

A University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography marine scientist has returned from a six-week research cruise to the Bering Sea and Chukchi Sea, the first time oceanographers have studied this Arctic region in winter during modern times.

On December 14, Rhode Island Sea Grant honored one of the global pioneers in coastal management, Professor Stephen B. Olsen, director of the Coastal Resources Center (CRC) at the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography.

Professor Olsen received Rhode Island Sea Grant's Lifetime Achievement Award, only the 6th such award given over its 40 year history, for his outstanding leadership of CRC and contributions to Rhode Island Sea Grant. Under his direction since 1975, CRC has developed a global reputation for innovation and action. CRC has raised over $70 million since 1985 to support programs in coastal resources management on three continents in the developing world as well as in the United States.

The Graduate School of Oceanography at the University of Rhode Island celebrated the recent retirement of one of its longest serving and most distinguished professors last week with a day-long symposium in his honor.

URI GSO alumnus Dr. Jeffrey Book (M.S. 1998, Ph.D. 2007) has been awarded the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on scientists and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers, the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.     

As an honoree, Dr. Book traveled to Washington, D.C., in October to attend a recognition ceremony led by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The University of Rhode Island's R/V Endeavor has commenced its 500th research cruise, carrying a group of faculty members, graduate and undergraduate students south across the Gulf Stream and into the Sargasso Sea on a seven-day expedition. The students and scientists will conduct measurements of the current in the Gulf Stream, sample for air and water pollutants, and collect samples of phytoplankton in the Sargasso Sea. The cruise is part research, and part training for students, who will learn about data collection and conducting science at sea by hands-on participation.