The Colorado Coralition: engaging landlocked youth in the restoration of staghorn coral in the Florida Keys, USA

Summary

Staghorn coral (Acropora cervicornis) populations have collapsed across the Florida Reef Tract since the 1970s from overfishing, disease, bleaching and the loss of a keystone grazing sea urchin, earning the species Critically Endangered status; the Coral Restoration Foundation (CRF) combats this decline by propagating coral fragments in offshore nurseries and outplanting them onto degraded reefs. Polaris Expeditionary Learning School, a public school in landlocked northern Colorado, built the Colorado Coralition, a year-long stewardship program using three school project weeks (scuba certification, service-learning and fundraising, and a Florida Keys expedition) to train and fund students to take part directly in CRF's restoration work under its federal and state permits. Offered in 2014-2015 and 2016-2017, the program brought 32 students total (ages 13-17) to outplant staghorn fragments, assist with offshore nursery maintenance and genetic tagging, and, from 2017, take part in citizen-science reef monitoring; students outplanted 100 fragments in 2015 and 40 more in 2017 despite storm-surge conditions, within a broader CRF effort that had outplanted over 11,000 staghorn and 1,800 elkhorn corals by September 2017. Participation dropped from 20 students in 2015 to 13 in 2017, addressed by recruiting five 2015 alumni as student leaders, raising 2017 participation to 18 ahead of a planned third trip in 2018-2019. Major obstacles included extensive fundraising for travel costs, scheduling scuba training around a school year, seasickness and ear-equalization problems limiting some students' diving, and weather-driven cancellations. The project rates itself successful, citing safe student participation in outplanting, nursery maintenance and monitoring, and strong ongoing interest in marine science careers among participants.