Thunderstorms early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. Low 72F. Winds SSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..
Thunderstorms early, then partly cloudy after midnight. Storms may contain strong gusty winds. Low 72F. Winds SSW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Updated: July 15, 2024 @ 3:49 pm
Left, Meriam Alessandroni, Woburn Memorial High School graduate; Right, Cara Wong Wilmington High School graduate
Left, Meriam Alessandroni, Woburn Memorial High School graduate; Right, Cara Wong Wilmington High School graduate
Two local students recently became interns with Ocean Research Institute (ORI), a non-profit organization centered around ecosystem-based ocean management, river/watershed science, and environmental justice. The goal is to advocate for a variety of environmental issues specifically through community-based engagement to practice stewardship, save wildlife, and protect ecosystems by organizing and connecting diverse groups and individuals.
Cara Wong, a Wilmington High School student now studying at Suffolk University, and Meriam Alessandroni, a Woburn Memorial High School student now studying at New York University, both joined ORI this summer and both through the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center internship program. They have spring, summer, and fall internship job boards where employers can find your information and you can reach out to those you are interested in.
Alessandroni said she “didn’t have a specific field/focus within environmental studies that I was actively pursuing in terms of an internship, so I was very open to any kind of environmental work.”
Wong said she “found the Ocean River Institute through this program back in February, reached out to my boss Rob Moir about joining his team, and the rest is history! I started working on June 10 with Rob and three other interns (including Alessandroni), and so far have learned a great deal.”
Both women are passionate about the environment. Alessandroni is currently an environmental studies major at NYU, part of the Future Fashion Group, which focuses on raising awareness of the social and environmental consequences of textile manufacturing. Her passion for the environment started after taking AP Environmental Science in high school.
Wong is currently double majoring in both environmental studies and political science. She actually added environmental studies as a minor, but “was so drawn to the issues occurring worldwide that I switched it to a second major. The more classes that I took, the more I was interested in studying further.”
Her original attraction to environmental studies occurred after she joined the Suffolk University debate team in 2022. As she noted:
“This was the first time my school had a debate program in decades. We engage in policy debate in the Cross Examination Debate Association (CEDA). They provide a resolution that is then debated for the school year.
“In 2022-2023, the resolution was ‘Resolved: The United States should vest legal rights and/or duties in one or more of the following: Artificial Intelligence, Nature, Nonhuman Animal Species.’ As a majority of schools that we were competing against provided arguments surrounding A.I., we chose to do something different.
“The plan we presented to for teams to compete against was ‘The United States should vest legal rights and/or duties to nature.’ While in debate you can narrow down to facets of the resolution, we remained broad and chose to indiscriminately regard ‘nature’ as ALL of nature, not even solely living organisms. All lands, waters, air, animals, plants, bacteria, etc. are all included within our policy.
“Our argument entailed that, for nature to be properly protected, it must be regarded as a person and therefore equal to humanity. In order for maximum environmental rights to be reached, nature has to be viewed at an equal footing to the people, and one avenue to ensure this is granting legal personhood.
“I found this easy to argue in favor of because planetary balance is crucial to not only the survival of nature, but humans as well.”
Alessandroni, meanwhile, realized she wanted to study the environment “through a general curiosity of the earth and natural systems, but also feeling an inherent responsibility to be a better steward.
“When you realize that everything is truly connected between natural processes, you become more conscious of your choices and impact whether that be through the food you eat or the clothes you buy. I wanted to become as informed as possible to be able to do my part and find ways for sustainable practices to become the norm for everyone.
“It always upsets me to see people being so wasteful or simply not caring about the environment, but at the end of the day you really have to be an optimist in this field. Environmental problems implicate everyone and everything, and a ‘it’s too late’ mindset is detrimental to action and future progress.”
The Woburn Memorial High School graduate added, “my major in environmental studies is comprehensive across environmental science, policy, earth systems science, urban environmental problems, climate change, environmental justice, and the overall relationship between nature and humans.”
Wong, with a double major in political science, as well, said she has no plans to run for office.
“While I enjoy drafting policies, I am uninterested in entering an office,” she stated. “My hope is to work in environmental policy and advocate for change as best that I can.”
With that said, she’s enjoying how her two majors overlap.
“For environmental classes, I chose to do several projects on deforestation issues, a topic I am personally quite passionate about,” Wong noted. “This past semester, I took a public policy writing course, and wrote a bill on combatting deforestation and restoring lost forests.”
Although Alessandroni has just one major (though she’s also pursuing a minor in Spanish), it’s quite broad and allows her to branch out across many environmental spectrums.
“It’s great to have a mix of humanities and sciences all within one major, especially for someone like me who’s chronically indecisive and just wants to try to soak in as much about the field as possible,” she said. “Naturally, the science side is crucial, but the policy and communicative parts are just as important; if people don’t care, are not correctly informed, or are not presented with realistic and equitable solutions, change won’t be implemented.”
The Woburn Memorial High School graduate jumped into the environmental deep-end, so to speak, after switching from AP Biology to AP Environmental Science because “I realized it was something I potentially wanted to study in college. When I was little, ‘global warming’ and ‘climate change’ were certainly not unfamiliar terms; I became more aware and concerned through the years with the increasing presence of environmentally related problems in the news and seeing change before my eyes, from increased flooding to uncharacteristically low snow for Massachusetts.
“AP Environmental Science was my first formal outlet to explore these changes and discover my passion. One of my favorite things we did was a project in collaboration with an Italian High School in Bologna to discuss and exchange environmental solutions occurring in our local communities and nationally.”
Neither woman had the opportunity to involve themselves in any climate action groups while in high school. However, Wong did join Mock Trial and Model United Nations, among other activities, that lead to her interest in political science, and Alessandroni joined the Future Fashion Group at NYU to help raise awareness about the social and environmental consequences of the textile
industry.
“This past semester I was a visual designer on our zine,” Alessandroni said, “whose theme was Age of Innovation: an emerging aesthetic realm where fashion fuses with elements of futurism, modularity, and multi-functionality.”
Over the summer, both women will work to protect the North Atlantic right whale, a “critically endangered species,” with only a few hundred left in the world (and 70 reproductively active females, according to Alessandroni). Wong said the whale got its name back in the late 1800s and early 1900s as they were considered the “right” whale to hunt.
They were hunted to near extinction until their species was banned from being hunted in 1935. However, pollution, strikes by ships, and entanglements by fishing gear are still causing great harms to the remaining North Atlantic right whales. More than half of right whales swimming into the path of an oncoming ship are struck when the ship is traveling 13 knots or faster.
Wong added how ORI wants to “pass a North Atlantic Right Whale National Marine Sanctuary to hopefully protect the whales from human-caused actions.”
Added Alessandroni, “By being better stewards on land and in the water, we can help save the North Atlantic Right Whale.”
In fact, research scientists with the New England Aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life were part of a team that spotted an entangled young North Atlantic right whale in Canada’s Gulf of St. Lawrence on June 22, documenting rope through the whale’s mouth, across the back, around the right flipper and trailing behind.
The Aquarium team was aboard the vessel FRC Charlie, along with the Canadian Whale Institute and Équipe de Désempêtrement du Golfe, when they spotted the entangled yearling east of Miscou Island, New Brunswick. Aquarium scientists were able to identify the whale as the 2023 calf of “War” (the mother).
As soon as the team determined the whale was entangled, they initiated contact with Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans and other entities operating in the area, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) plane surveying in the area in collaboration with Canadian partners. The tagged whale is being closely monitored and disentanglement efforts are underway and will continue as weather permits.
For anyone interested in the environment, both Wong and Alessandroni offered nothing but praise for ORI and its leader, Dr. Rob Moir.
“I would encourage other students passionate about the environment to apply. Dr. Rob Moir has extensive knowledge and many years of experience, and as such is not only a great boss, but an excellent teacher as well. Students that would like to advocate for environmental justice could learn a great deal from working with this organization,” said Wong.
“I would definitely encourage students who have an interest in the environment to get involved with the ORI! Rob is extremely passionate and knowledgeable and I have already learned a lot in my
time here so far, added Alessandroni.”
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