How I Decided to Become anOceanographer?

Ithaca

Shelton

I grew up in a tiny town in Washington State with a population of about 7,000 people

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Shelton

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The Main Jobs in My Town Were at the Lumber Mill or at Logging Camps in the Nearby Olympic Mountains...

I took lots of vacations to the ocean while growing up always had a lot of fun there...

I really enjoyed science when I was in grade school...

All of my friends in high school just wanted to take wood-shop and carpentry classes and none of them really wanted to take any science classes...

Even though I liked science a lot, I sort of felt like I needed to do what all my friends were doing - and that was kind of a mistake...

I think also my mom did not ask me to take any science classes because she just didn’t know any better. My mom did not go to college and she never really understood much about science or if it would be good for me to take science classes...

In High School...

After High School...I continued to do what all my friends were doing and began working as a logger in the Olympic Mountains near where I grew up...

At first I really enjoyed working hard and running all the big machines and earning some money. But after a while

something sort of felt missing in my life...

And Then Something Really Big Happened To Me....

I “finally” realized that I did not have to do exactly the same thing that all my friends were doing!!

I started to see for the first time that I could do or be anything “I” wanted to be - and that “I” was in charge of “Me”

So began to dream BIG about what “I” wanted to do!

I started to ask myself: what was the coolest possible thing I could be when I grew up?

I thought and I thought for almost a whole year about all the possibilities in the world and then I finally figured out what I wanted to do...

The Big Thing That Happened to Me...

I finally decided that I wanted to be an Oceanographer!

1.I Liked Science!

I remembered back when I was in 5th grade and how much fun it was to do science.

In 5th grade I was free to do what I really liked

In high school I sort of felt like I had to do what all my friends were doing - a pretty big mistake

2.I Wanted to Travel the World! I figured that the ocean was on all sides of the planet and that if I studied the ocean I would get a chance to travel around the word!

The two main reasons for this decision were...

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University of Washington

Me and Two Friends at the University of Washington’s Friday Harbor Marine Labs on Puget Sound

Me and a Friend in Alaska Before Getting on An Oceanography Research Ship...

While at the University of Washington I started to go on month-long research cruises. Here I am with a college

classmate in the Gulf of Alaska...

I Finally Graduated From the University of Washington...

I then moved to Hawaii to study at the University of Hawaii to become a doctor of oceanography...

Me and My Friend Inspecting the Submarine

Me Climbing into the Submarine

Seeing the Bottom of the Ocean From the Submarine

My Friend and the Pilot Having Lunch in the Submarine

Going to graduate school was a mix of fun and hard work. I studied hard to be the best - but mainly I studied hard because it was FUN!

I Finally Graduated And Became A Doctor of Oceanography!

After receiving my PhD in Hawaii I went on to work at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland where I learned to use orbiting satellites to observe changes in the ocean at global scales...

And Now Do Ocean Science Research and I Teach Students at Cornell...

Me Teaching Students in Thailand About Satellite Remote Sensing...

I am also now traveling a lot and seeing the word as I had hoped for when I first began all of this!

Traveling to Oman Last Month to Talk About Starting a New Satellite Research Project For the Coast of Oman ...

Traveling to Rome to Visit Oceanography Friends...

Traveling to Jerusalem to Visit Oceanography Friends...

Traveling to India Last January with Oceanography Friends...

And people from around the world now come to Ithaca to learn from me! These students were here in Ithaca two weeks ago for my class...

Oman

PhilippinesMalaysia

Portugal

Canada

China

The Netherlands

PhilippinesBulgaria

So It Has Been A Long and VERY Fun Life-Journey...

I have come a long way since I was this dorky kid from a tiny little logging town on Puget Sound...

At first I thought this was going to me my whole life...

But then I remembered back to what I really liked when I was in grade school!!

I finally decided that I wanted to be an Oceanographer!

1.I Liked Science!

I remembered back when I was in 5th grade and how much fun it was to do science.

In 5th grade I was free to do what I really liked

In high school I sort of felt like I had to do what all my friends were doing - a pretty big mistake

2.I Wanted to Travel the World! I figured that the ocean was on all sides of the planet and that if I studied the ocean I would get a chance to travel around the word!

The two main reasons for this decision were...

And now I am doing science and seeing the world...

My life has worked out pretty well (so far) mainly because I finally decided to follow my own dreams of what “I” wanted to do

When I was in 5th grade I could feel pretty clearly inside of me what I liked the most (in my own case it was science) - it was at a time in my life when I was not very influenced by what my friends thought I should like...

You are still not too far away from that 5th grader, I encourage you to take stock right now of what you really like to do and then try to keep this idea with you through high school AND through your whole life!!! Start Dreaming BIG right now!

Conclusion

I Will Leave You With This Reminder....