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How corals can help us make predictions about our future under climate change (cross-posted from ReefBites)
This blog post originally appeared on ReefBites, the student blog of the International Society for Reef Studies. Every two to seven years, the eastern equatorial Pacific climate oscillates between anomalously warm (El Niño) and cold (La Niña) conditions in a process known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). This process influences sea surface temperatures…
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“We are not drowning, we are fighting”: Pacific Islanders want you to know that they still have hope for their islands
This blog post originally appeared on the Ocean Leaders blog, which highlights the work of Ocean Leaders fellows. Please consider giving them a follow on social media at @oceanleaders on Twitter or OceanLeadersUBC on Facebook! This past weekend, I was on a discussion panel for the documentary film Anote’s Ark, which follows the former present of…
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Tiabo for now, Kiribati
I’m currently sitting in the departure terminal in Tarawa, the capital of Kiribati. It is a small room made of mismatched wood paneling, with one wall open to the tarmac, and a concrete floor. There are no lights, and a huge fan in the corner keeps the air moving, although it’s still sweltering. My back…
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Corals are smelly and other anecdotes from the field
There are so many things to love about fieldwork. As scientists, it’s an opportunity to finally get our hands dirty (so to speak) and interact with the systems we’re studying. It’s also invaluable to get to know the communities and people who live in the places we work (scientists commonly treat people as separate from…
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Diversity in geoscience: Participation, behaviour, and the scientific division of labour at a Canadian geoscience conference
I’m taking a quick break from posting updates about fieldwork in Kiribati to announce that a study I co-authored has been published! Some colleagues and I attended the 2017 Canadian Geophysicists Union meeting in Vancouver with the goal of examining diversity through observations of participation, presentation content, and behaviour in conference sessions. We found that women…
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Getting to know Tarawa
It was exciting to finally step foot in Tarawa, the capital of the Republic of Kiribati, after hearing about it for so long — my advisor has worked here for a decade or so, and I’ve spent my last three years as his student hearing about his work and its accompanying adventures. I’ve also spoken…
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Counting down to fieldwork in the Gilbert Islands
In just over a month, I’ll be boarding a plane and heading to Tarawa, an atoll in the Gilbert Islands of Kiribati. I’ll be staying in Tarawa and the nearby Abaiang Atoll for about a month to conduct the first stage of my Ph.D. fieldwork. It’s been a long, dark, rainy winter in Vancouver and…
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Recent study of scientists and advocacy overlooks gender and racial biases
With the April 22 March for Science in Washington, DC quickly approaching and the current anti-scientific stance of the American government, the scientific community is abuzz with debate over what role scientists should play in activism. In the midst of these contentious times comes a new paper published in the journal Environmental Communication from George…
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Interview: Scientific research and beauty mix on the Marshall Islands
Recently, I was invited to be a part of last weekend’s episode of the CBC radio show, Quirks and Quarks. The episode explored the ways that scientists spent their summers. It was my first recorded interview, and I was thrilled to be asked to participate. I was also extremely nervous. Fortunately both the producer, Mark Crawley, and the…
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Bar loe kom (see you later), Marshall Islands!
In Marshallese, iokwe means hello, goodbye, and I love you. Translated literally, it means “you are a rainbow.” It’s not a word that’s reserved for family members or even for friends; if you walk down the street in Majuro, strangers who pass you greet you with iokwe. It is, in my opinion, a beautiful way to tell people…
Sara E. Cannon, PhD
Aquatic Conservation Scientist
Sara E. Cannon, PhD 