• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Site Directory
  • Home
  • Alex’s Lounge
  • P.O.U. Health and Fitness
  • POU Comments of the Week
  • P.O.U. Daily Link Sweep
Pragmatic Obots Unite

Pragmatic Obots Unite

Shooting down firebaggers & teabaggers one truth at a time...

Wednesday Open Thread: African Americans in Oceanography/Marine Biology

January 9, 2013 by Miranda 154 Comments

Happy Hump Day Obots!

Today’s Scientist of the Sea is Ashanti Johnson.

From TheGrio:

As an African-American girl growing up in Dallas, Texas, Ashanti Johnson wanted to be like a famous French man: Jacques Cousteau.

“My first exposure [to oceanography] was watching him on TV,” says Johnson, 39. “The ocean for me represented the unknown… I think because it was so vast and diverse.”

But as she pursued an education in oceanography, Johnson realized her field of study wasn’t so diverse. When she enrolled at Texas A&M University at Galveston, there were only eight black people at the university known for marine studies. Johnson became the first African-American to receive a degree in marine science. The view wasn’t much different at Texas A & M’s main campus, where she became the first African-American to earn a Ph.D. in oceanography.

“To some extent, my community [of scientists] has not done the greatest job in letting the public know about career opportunities in earth system sciences. If you’re smart, you’re told you can be a doctor or lawyer… but people don’t know what a geologist or oceanographer does,” says Johnson.

After becoming an assistant professor of chemical oceanography at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science in 2003, Johnson created the Minorities Striving and Pursuing Higher Degrees of Success in Earth System Science initiative. Since its inception, MS PHDS has helped more than 175 minority college students majoring in earth system science find jobs and network with other minority scientists. Johnson says the program also gives minority students who often feel isolated in their respective majors, a much-needed support system.

“They call it the MS PHDS family. So once you’re adopted into it, you’re part of the family for life,” says Johnson.

Johnson’s efforts were even recognized by President Barack Obama. In January, she was honored with the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring.

Johnson says she’s just getting started. Her hope is to make MS PHDS a model program for other majors like math and physics. Perhaps making even more fields where minorities are underrepresented, as colorful as the deep, blue sea.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anrGN4MwD9Y]

Filed Under: African Americans, Education, Open Thread, Science Tagged With: African Americans in Oceanography and Marine Biology, Ashanti Johnson, Oceanography, Science

Primary Sidebar

Recent Comments

Powered by Disqus

Twitter

Tweets by @PragObots

Recent Posts

  • Saturday Open Thread: Stories from the Freedmen’s Bureau Records
  • Friday Open Thread: Stories from the Freedmen’s Bureau Records
  • Thursday Open Thread: Stories from the Freedmen’s Bureau Records
  • Wednesday Open Thread: Stories from the Freedmen’s Bureau Records
  • Tuesday Open Thread: Stories from the Freedmen’s Bureau Records

Tags

#HTGAWM #TGIT African American History African History Black History Civil Rights Movement Divas Forward Friday Open Thread Funk Grammy Winners Great Bands Hip-Hop How To Get Away With Murder Jazz Kerry Washington Legends Monday Open Thread Motown Records NFL Obama Biden 2012 Olivia Pope Open Thread P.O.U. Sunday Jazz Brunch POU Weekly NFL Picks President Barack H. Obama President Barack Obama President Obama R&B racism Rap Saturday Open Thread Scandal Shondaland Shonda Rhimes slavery Songwriters Soul Sports Sunday Open Thread Thursday Open Thread Tuesday Open Thread Video Viola Davis Wednesday Open Thread

Footer

A-F

  • African American Pundit
  • Afrospear
  • All About Race
  • Angry Black Lady Chronicles
  • AverageBro.com
  • Black Politics on the Web
  • Blacks 4 Barack
  • Blue Wave News
  • Brown Man Thinking Hard
  • Crooks and Liars
  • Democracy Now!
  • Democrats for Progress
  • Eclectablog
  • Extreme Liberal's Blog
  • FactCheck.org
  • Field Negro
  • FiveThirtyEight

G-S

  • GrannyStandingforTruth
  • Hello, Negro
  • Jack & Jill Politics
  • Latino Politico
  • Margaret and Helen
  • Melissa Harris Perry
  • Michelle Obama Watch
  • Mirror On America
  • Momma, here come that woman again!
  • New Black Woman
  • Obama Foodorama
  • Obama for America 2012
  • Positively Barack
  • Raving Black Lunatic
  • Sheryl Kaye's Blog
  • Sojourner's Place
  • Stuff White People Do

T-Z

  • Talking Points Memo
  • The Black Snob Feed
  • The Field
  • The Hill
  • The Mudflats
  • The Obama Diary
  • The only adult in the room
  • The Peoples View
  • The Reid Report
  • The Rude Pundit
  • The Starting Five
  • ThinkProgress
  • This Week in Blackness
  • Tim Wise
  • Uppity Negro Network
  • What About Our Daughters
  • White House Blog
  • Womanist Musings

Copyright © 2025 · Log in