Seattle Aquarium Society-Seas

Programs: Since opening on may 20, 1977, the seattle aquarium has been an integral part of the city and the region, providing a platform for education and conservation. Visitors of all ages from near and far come to the seattle aquarium to see up close our charismatic collection of animals, including sea otters and octopuses, and to discover the wonders of our oceans. Today, the aquarium has played host to more than 26 million visitors, 850,000 visitors annually since 2015, and continues to inspire conservation of our marine environment. The seattle aquarium is the eighth-largest aquarium in the us based on attendance. Continued on schedule othe seattle aquarium has undertaken, and continues to implement, new initiatives and projects as part of our operations: 2010: transitioned from city to non-profit management. 2013: opened our new harbor seal exhibit for better public viewing and more meaningful interpretive experience for both our visitors and engagement staff. 2014: played host to our inaugural dreamnight, an after-hours event for children and adults with chronic illnesses and disabilities to explore our exhibits at their own pace. 2015: received the first-ever innovation in volunteer engagement award from the association of zoos and aquariums for our beach naturalist program. 2016: rehabilitated a stranded, cold-stunned olive ridley sea turtle "tucker" over many months and transported him to southern california to complete his recovery and restored the rescued sea otter "rialto" to health and successfully transferred him to the vancouver aquarium upon recovery. 2017: seattle aquarium leadership strengthened our partnership with the city of seattle and other stakeholders in growing the physical and conservation footprint of the aquarium on the waterfront and around the globe. The seattle aquarium is the heart of the seattle waterfront and a destination for residents, school groups, community groups and touring visitors alike. We serve our community through a variety of channels, including education programs, visitor engagement, conservation projects and research initiatives. As an informal science education center, we are on the leading edge of creating scientifically-literate and informed citizens. We believe conservation of the marine environment relies upon our visitors leaving us with a greater respect and knowledge for the ocean and marine animals than they did when they first entered our doors. The seattle aquarium has underway major initiatives that will shape the future of the organization: association of zoos and aquariums (aza) accreditation: the seattle aquarium has been accredited by the aza since 1979, which means that we meet the highest standards for animal care and welfare. In 2017, the seattle aquarium will submit its aza accreditation renewal, a process done every five years, that reaffirms that the organization continues to use best practices through an independent evaluation and inspection. The aquarium, along with the woodland park zoo, will host the annual aza conference in 2018 and spend much of 2017 planning for the event and preparing marketing materials for presentation at the september 2017 conference in indianapolis. Conservation visioning: in 2016, the seattle aquarium hired consultant julie henry to lead an effort engaging stakeholders in and outside the aquarium, leadership and staff in taking a big picture view of conservation and how the seattle aquarium can build on our strengths while taking advantage of new opportunities, like the aquarium expansion. In 2017, ms. Henry will wrap up the final workshops and create a guiding plan from the visioning process. This plan will be implemented in the third and fourth quarters of 2017 and beyond. Advance campus expansion: this coming year will be key to moving our expansion forward as seattle builds a new 20-acre park on its waterfront. Many benchmarks will be met over the year including a completed schematic design and environmental impact study for the ocean pavilion; a concept program and cost estimate for a new off-site holding facility; and early schematic designs, illustrations and floor plans for pier 59 renovations. Public and private funding plans are being explored for all phases of the expansion. Programmatic highlights from 2016 are below:community engagement and outreach: our community engagement team has been successful in implementing and growing events like dreamnight, open house and our community ticket program. This team also manages our very successful education programs: beach naturalist and cedar river salmon journeys. Highlights 2016:dreamnights are free evenings welcoming children and adults with a disability or serious medical conditions and their families to the aquarium. In 2016, we served 870 guests, increased attendance from 2015, despite severe weather on one date. Community ticket program distributed 47,684 free aquarium tickets to 289 agencies, a 21 percent increase over 2015. Seattle aquarium open house is a community event welcoming families through our partner organizations that work with immigrant and refugee families in low-income communities (especially in south seattle neighborhoods). In 2016, 684 guests joined us speaking 12 different languages from 14 community partners. The event benefited from 35 community volunteers from eight organizations, 20 aquarium volunteers, materials in seven languages, and translators available for 15 languages. On the beaches, 226 beach naturalists had 66,722 conversations on 23 beach dates on 12 local beaches (up 21 percent from last year on only one additional beach day). In the second season of the cedar river salmon journey program under the aquarium umbrella, 117 volunteer naturalists spoke with more than 11,604 visitors about salmon, watershed health and actions everyone can take to help salmon and their habitat at four sites on the cedar river and other locations. In the near future, we wish to increase the opportunity for staff dialogue around diversity and inclusion, improve delivery of all programs through increased engagement and attendance and examine the need and viability of an internship program directed toward typically underserved communities. School and public programs: the school and family programs team provides education programming to schools and groups at the aquarium and in schools. Among the programs in this administered by this department are citizen science, toddler time, summer camps and after-school enrichment programs. Highlights 2016:in 2016, 37,673 students and chaperones from 542 schools in 108 districts visited the seattle aquarium. Marine summer camp concluded its 16th year over 10 consecutive weeks in june, july and august with 18 themed sessions, 305 youth and 10 scholarships awarded. Toddler time program completed its 12th year and offered families 34 program dates attended by 2,000 children and 2,057 adults, a participation increase of 34 percent from 2015. The citizen science program completed its 10th year of the 15-year monitoring program, with 14 teachers and approximately 440 students monitoring 14 beaches. Delivered six 8-10 week sessions of an after-school enrichment, amazing sea animals, to approximately 76 students at three schools through two programs: ymca powerful schools and communities in schools. The school and public programs team delivered 160 outreach programs to audiences outside the aquarium, reaching 4,093 participants. Fifty-one of these programs received scholarships. Our staff seeks to grow connections to key organizations as our campus and conservation needs grow as part of the expansion. The aquarium began to implement recommendations from the new conservation plan. Adult and teen volunteer training: volunteers are essential to our mission delivery and low signage/high talk model to engage visitors. Without our dedicated corps of volunteers we would not be able to reach as many people or provide as many programs. The hours volunteered were approximately equivalent to 47 full-time staff persons. Highlights 2016:in 2016, a total of 1,235 volunteers (including 233 new volunteers in 2016) donated 97,812 hours of service. We engaged 88 community and corporate volunteers in one-time events: splash! , adult swim, dreamnight and open house. Those volunteers contributed 770 hours of service to the aquarium. 233 volunteers completed 14 "aquaversity" continuing education classes to keep their skills sharp and knowledge up to date. Likewise,131 youth ocean advocates participated in 12 continuing education opportunities through the aquarium for a total of 1,132 hours of continuing education contact hours.