Abstract
Environmental education is essential for supporting ocean literacy and encouraging behaviors that protect marine environments. Yet, many elementary school students lack access to hands-on marine science learning that connects them to the local environments around them. This project addressed this gap by advancing the Water Advocates and Visionaries for the Environment and Sea (WAVES) program at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science. The WAVES field trip hosted 110 elementary students and 8 administrators and teachers from two Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Students rotated through 11 interactive educational stations led by university researchers, providing hands-on exposure to
marine science concept and conservation behaviors. The first WAVES teacher professional development was a two-day in-person workshop that served a total of 18 local teachers and school administrators. These sessions included guided tours of marine research labs, hands-on training with WAVES lesson plans, and a field-based shark tagging excursion with the Shark Research and Conservation (SRC) program. Teachers received standards-aligned lesson plans and educational kits designed for easy classroom integration. A systematic literature review was also executed through full-text screening and advanced into data extraction using Covidence, identifying 19 relevant studies addressing marine science education and pro-environmental behavior development in elementary students. Final synthesis of the included studies revealed strong national trends toward inquiry-based, place-based, and pollution-focused marine education efforts, providing a clear foundation for future WAVES curriculum. The review also underscored a notable gap in measurable pro-marine environmental behaviors among elementary students, highlighting a key opportunity for WAVES to incorporate more behavior-focused assessments in future programming. Overall, this project expanded access to marine science education, improved teacher preparedness in incorporating marine science into their classrooms and strengthened the WAVES program for future implementation. Continued refinement of logistics, teacher resources, and student assessment methods will support long-term environmental stewardship among students.