About Alaska Sea Grant Education Services
“Public information needs are as varied as our population is diverse. Some individuals will benefit from detailed information on how specific issues directly affect their jobs or business. Others may need information presented in a language and media tailored to their culture and community. Still others seek advice on how to alter their own activities to support responsible ocean stewardship.
“It is critical that decisions about ocean and coastal resources be based on the most current, credible, and unbiased scientific data and information. Formal and informal ocean education should be strengthened to better engage the general public, cultivate a broad stewardship ethic, and prepare a new generation of leaders to meet future ocean policy challenges.”
These excerpts from An Ocean Blueprint for the 21st Century: Final Report of the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy express a national resolve to convey credible, science-based information about the nation’s oceans, coasts, and Great Lakes to Americans in all walks of life.
That’s what Alaska Sea Grant Education Services does.
In collaboration with researchers, Marine Advisory Program staff and faculty, educators, and others, communication specialists with Alaska Sea Grant Education Services employ an array of award-winning tools and techniques to compile, package, promote, and disseminate information aimed at helping people understand and wisely manage, use, and conserve Alaska’s marine and coastal resources.
Traditional communication tools and techniques—publications, videos, news releases, and radio—are mainstays. We keep these tried-and-true techniques fresh and effective by constantly updating them as communication theory and practice evolve. We present much of our information via the Alaska Sea Grant website, created and maintained by Education Services in partnership with Alaska Sea Grant administration.
Most recently, Education Services has tapped into rapidly evolving Internet social media opportunities, sharing information on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, and offering an RSS feed of our news.
We further extend our electronic reach by sharing news and other useful information with email newsletters, Fishlines (monthly news about Alaska Sea Grant) and NewsFlash (updates on our king crab research).
Alaska Sea Grant Education Services supports all parts of the Alaska Sea Grant enterprise. To see some examples, we invite you to explore just a few of the communication efforts and products, as represented in the Alaska Sea Grant website:
Publications Production and Marketing
Education Services publishes and distributes thousands of educational books and other publications. We facilitate worldwide dissemination of our information products through an online bookstore which includes a sophisticated shopping cart feature, all of which Education Services specialists created and maintain. We also established the first-ever product marketing position in the history of Sea Grant.
Media Relations and Radio
Education Services provides information about natural resource science of Alaska via an archive of Arctic Science Journeys Radio stories, and convey information about Alaska Sea Grant activities through an archive of Coastwise Radio, both programs produced in-house. We also convey information by news releases.
Lowell Wakefield Fisheries Symposia
Education Services staff collaborate with ASG administration and the NOAA Fisheries Service, Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and the North Pacific Fishery Management Council to coordinate and sponsor the Lowell Wakefield Fisheries Symposium Series, the world’s longest running series of annual conferences on high latitude marine fisheries biology and management. This includes publication of promotional and registration materials, abstract booklets, agendas, and meeting proceedings books. Our staff also helps organize and coordinate other local, regional, and national meetings.
Support for National Sea Grant Network
The national Sea Grant network is composed of 32 state and territorial programs and the National Sea Grant Office (NSGO) at NOAA headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland. The programs cooperate in many ways, and Education Services has a long history of contributions to the network. Highlights include:
- Designed the national Sea Grant logo and co-authored logo use guidelines.
- Created and maintain the national Sea Grant logo website.
- Create official logos for the other Sea Grant programs.
- Helped lead the national network into use of the World Wide Web.
- National network communication leaders have twice elected our Education Services manager to chair the National Sea Grant Communicators Steering Committee (1993 and 2005).
- In consultation with network communication leaders and the NSGO, the ASG Education Services manager rewrote the section of the national Sea Grant policy manual that defines the role of Sea Grant communicators.
- Education Services manager composed peer review questions and developed a scoring system (approved by the NSGO) for network programs to use to assess and score state program communication proposals. The Web application was created by the Education Services communications designer.
- Education Services manager conceived and composed, and our communications designer rendered, an online reporting form for submission of national network communication success summaries to the Sea Grant Association.
- Education Services manager compiled biographies and photos of the Sea Grant network communication leaders to place in a Facebook directory on the National Sea Grant website.
- Education Services publications manager served as chair of the Pacific Region communicators network.
- Education Services communications designer served as chair of the National Sea Grant Communicators web group (2007). Session speaker for Sea Grant Week, Maine, 2005.
- Web and database coordinator and Education Services Web developer are involved in a national Sea Grant effort to improve the tracking of impacts and outcomes of individual programs' efforts using Web and database technology.
- Education Services staff handled logistics and created the website for the biennial 2012 national Sea Grant network meeting, "Sea Grant Week," held in Girdwood, the first time the national meeting has occurred in Alaska.
Education Services Staff
Kurt Byers
Education Services Manager
Role
Plan and guide Alaska Sea Grant’s communications activities, conceive and help create information products. Represent ASG at meetings/events. Member of Management Team. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in June 1988.
Expertise
Identifying and applying communication and marketing techniques to convey useful information about Alaska’s ocean and coastal resources. Project management, strategic planning, writing/editing, photography, videography.
Carol Kaynor
Web and Database Coordinator
Role
Coordinate and develop World Wide Web presence for public information and education. Provide Web-based administrative services for faculty, administration, and federal funding agencies. Provide primary technical desktop computer and IT support to staff. Coordinate database development and maintenance. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in September 1993.
Expertise
Website design and usability, search engine optimization, editing, online publication production, working with database users and developers.
Sue Keller
Publications Manager
Role
Manage publishing efforts—manage peer review, edit publications, manage production. Assist with product distribution and publication marketing. Write Sea Grant newsletter Fishlines, compile/edit monthly ASG report to the Dean of the UAF School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, edit the newsletter for ASG's Alaska King Crab Research, Rehabilitation and Biology Program. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in January 1988.
Expertise
Science editing, publishing industry, publication presentation, production management.
Kathy Kurtenbach
Sales and Marketing Coordinator
Role
Conceive and implement marketing plans, strategies, and promotional tactics for ASG educational products. Evaluate effectiveness of marketing efforts. Represent ASG and market educational products at events, including fishing industry trade shows, home school fairs, and library, museum/aquarium, and bookseller conferences. Develop direct mail campaigns, build and maintain product promotions via the Internet, and make sales calls. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in January 2001.
Expertise
Marketing ASG publications and videos to a wide audience and providing good customer service. Skills in marketing educational training materials through direct mail, phone calls, and trade shows. Creation of promotional materials and direct mail pieces, including publication layout and production.
Dawn Montano
Distribution Assistant
Role
Receive, invoice, and ship publication orders. Oversee the organization and tracking of inventory. Pull, package, and ship publications for sponsored ASG events. Assist marketing coordinator with special projects. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in September 2008.
Expertise
Customer relations, data entry, order fulfillment. Design promotional materials and direct mail pieces for marketing and displays.
Dave Partee
Communications Designer and Web Developer
Role
Web and publication design, multimedia, and photography; Web and database programming. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in June 2004, after five years as Web Coordinator at the UAF School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences.
Expertise
Web design, publication design and layout, multimedia, and photography; graphics formats and software, especially Aperture, Photoshop and InDesign; PHP/MySQL/FileMaker web and database programming. Macintosh system administration.
Doug Schneider
Information Officer
Role
News release writing and distribution, media placement tracking, news media interaction, science writing; general writing for publications such as calendar, email pub announcements, one-pagers, project directory, and reports; and other writing tasks as assigned. Track research progress for report-writing and database. Joined Alaska Sea Grant in July 1988.
Expertise
Print and radio broadcast writing and production, multimedia production.
