Isabel Marlens '12, conservation intern at Hawaii Wildlife Fund
February 08 2010
Bennington students go out into the world for part of each year they attend the College, completing seven-week winter internships in areas that fascinate them and complement their studies. They bring back stories from across the country and across the globe. This internship period is called Field Work Term, and it's been going strong since the College's founding.
"I've always been interested in environmental conservation," says Isabel Marlens '12. "In my first term, I took the Ocean Project design lab [with biologist Elizabeth Sherman and visual artist Jon Isherwood], during which we tackled many environmental issues. That really led into this whole thing"—a Field Work Term internship at the Hawaii Wildlife Fund, which works to preserve Hawaii's fragile marine ecosystem.
Inspired by her design lab, Isabel had contacted the Wildlife Fund's founder and director, Bill Gilmartin, through a mutual friend. She soon secured a position as a conservation intern, and within a few months, she was living in
Volcano Village, right next to Kilauea volcano. "Everyone keeps their eye out,"
she says, "to see if their houses are going to be buried in lava at any moment.
It was interesting that people whose lives are so influenced by the environment—possibly even in a negative way—care so passionately about not degrading it."
"‘The Great Pacific Garbage Patch' is twice the size of Texas and hundreds of meters deep."
Isabel says she "loves to be outside," and she spent many of her days out in the Hawaii sun, doing hands-on ocean cleanup with other Wildlife Fund workers. "There's a lot of debris floating in the ocean that ends up washing up because of prevailing currents," she says. "It comes from what is referred to as ‘The Great Pacific Garbage Patch,' which is twice the size of Texas and hundreds of meters deep. The edges of this patch get hooked on the southeastern coast of the Big Island, and the organization I worked with is trying to clear that."
The process was not an easy one. As Isabel describes it, "We had to pick up the trash—fishing nets, for the most part—and drive it out to a transfer station. There, the weave and color of the nets is analyzed in an
attempt to hold the country where it was manufactured accountable. Unfortunately, the process isn't very accurate, because you really do need a full net to properly identify it and you rarely ever get that. But the good news," she adds, "is the nets are placed in shipping containers toward Honolulu, where they are burned for energy. So they end up serving a purpose." (The other type of debris found in mass quantities? Plastic toothbrushes and combs.)
Isabel wrote, photographed, and designed a brochure on fragile Hawaiian ecosystems.
When she wasn't clearing debris, Isabel wrote, photographed, and designed a brochure on fragile Hawaiian ecosystems—a fitting project, since she plans to study both environmental science and literature at Bennington. The publication will raise awareness "about the coastal area and the threats it faces, such as debris. The native plants in this area are fragile and unique, and its ponds are menaced by development, livestock, and people. The rocks by these ponds are also important cultural sites for ancient Hawaiians...with petroglyphs and drawings on many stones."
She completed the project almost entirely on her own. As with many aspects of her work, "I had to figure things out for myself, which
was a little intimidating—but in the end, I actually contributed to a
real-world situation and made a real difference. It was great." She was also
working side-by-side with accomplished conservationists. "They were all very
humble.... They wouldn't talk much about their experiences, but then you'd hear,
‘Yeah, she won Conservationist of the Year for her attempts to interrupt
missile testing.' It was inspiring."
"In the end, I actually contributed to a real-world situation and made a real difference."
And Isabel didn't arrive unprepared. Her recent experience in the design lab at Bennington, she says, "was really useful. In general,
assembling information for the brochure was very similar to the research I did for my design lab's final project. I had already read a lot about fishing nets, and learned how to use constructive language to discuss environmental issues. For instance, don't say ‘being destroyed'; rather, use ‘degraded'—that way, you won't polarize the dialogue from the get-go."
Given the chance to offer a final word, though, Isabel puts it simply: "I just want to tell people to use less plastic."