Name: Samuel Beacher

Social Justice Group: 2018-2019, Ocean Health

Date of Fieldwork: January 7, 2019

Name of Organization: Wildlife Conservation Society

Person (people) with whom I met and their job titles: Edward Perri and Noah Chesnin New York Aquarium docents

Type of Fieldwork: Tour of Organization

What I did:

We went to the New York Aquarium and had a private tour of the new shark exhibit as well as the filtration system. They talked to us extensively about these two things.

What I learned:

I learned that sharks are heavily endangered because of overfishing. I also learned that sharks are at the top of the food chain in adulthood but can be at the bottom during childhood.

What I learned about Social Justice “work” and/or Civil and Human rights “work” from this fieldwork:

Through the fieldwork, I learned that there are many factors going on trying to save the sharks and those trying to kill them. One is a ban on plastic straws. This would stop decrease the amount of plastic unnecessarily going into the ocean. They would only be offered on request. Also, there could be oil and gas deposits off of the East Coast. These were going to be protected but the Trump Administration decided to go ahead with trying to find the deposits. Even the fact of finding the will be detrimental as the sound waves can disturb whales.