 
One of our most important features here in the Marine Science program is the
fact that we have the public aquarium and that public aquarium is great
resource for students. The OCC aquarium is actually public so the public can
come in free any time they want
during the week. We also do science night once a year, which is targeted
towards elementary school kids, which is really fun for them. We have a touch tank
they get to actually see what being a marine scientist or marine biologist
is all about.
I was a big part with helping out with science night and making sure that
everything ran smoothly there. I was in charge of the touch tank so I got to
talk to people as they were experiencing touching a shark for
probably the first time in their lives in a lot of cases.
It’s a massive thing that we do
educating these kids and kind of bringing awareness to not just the aquarium but
science in general. Getting these kids interested in the sciences because
they are going to be the ones shaping our future so if we can get them
interested now in fish where it can be something as easy as they like
the way that fish looks, that one looks funny. That kind of spark could
manifest into something a little more potent later on in their life where they
can look back on these experiences maybe when they’re
future scientists changing the world.
We get to do a lot of different types of things. Rather than just one whole
tropical system we have tropical, temperate, brackish, fresh water so we have a
lot going on in there. In terms of tours, we welcome students from young
kindergarten and preschool age all the way up to visiting faculty from other
universities or colleges or public aquariums.
We love to give tours to everybody. If you guys want to learn more about us,
you can visit us at facebook.com/occaquarium
 
