It was another great meeting at The Pirates House!  President Ben Brewer announced that the club had submitted their application for a district grant which will be spent on 21 refrigerators for The Tiny House project.  Cindy Kelley mentioned she would like volunteers to help unload and place the refrigerators in the homes once they are delivered.  With Paul Tatum being away, Barrett Benton introduced our speaker for the day, Clark Alexander who is the Director and President of the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography.  
 
Dr. Alexander's talk centered around educating us about the institute.  The Skidaway Institute of Oceanography is one of four marine programs on the coast and is a unique multidisciplinary institute within the University of Georgia.  The Skidaway Institute focus on research and graduate education.  They have 12 faculty, 36 staff, and anywhere from 5-10 students.  The institute was founded in 1968 when the Roebling family deeded 700 acres of land for use as a marine science center.  The mission of the institute is to do cutting edge research, provide research based education, and scientific support and advice for marine related issues along Georgia's coast.  
 
The Skidaway Institute of Oceanography has an annual budge of $7 million which is funded through federal grants or federally funded state agencies.  They have the only NSF funded research vessel from Maine to Delaware which is appropriately named R/V Savannah.  They have state of the art labs, research library, and on campus housing.  Their current research spans the globe from New Zealand to SouthEast Asia and Antarctica.  They typically have 60 projects at any time.  Since this is the 50th Anniversary of the institute, they are offering a series of monthly public programs.  The next one will be on July 10th from 6:15 pm  - 8:00 pm.  To learn more about the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography and their educational programs, please visit http://www.skio.uga.edu/