Best marine science student in the world - 2nd year running.

The best marine science student in the world second year running, 2015 and 2016.
Well Done Christine (2016) and Tom (2015)  :-) :-)

Classroom with a view. And excellent place to study.

TRACC teaching has recieved the fantastic news that for the second year, we have beaten all other students across the world to achieve the honour of highest scoring Cambridge Examinations Marine Science student in 2016.

The rest of the ALL STAR students in 2016 also did really well with only A*, A’s and B’s.

In 2015, we also manged the best marine science student in the world plus great results all round

Do you need great results to help get into University? Gap year or year out with a qualification!  Do you want to be a better Scuba divemaster or Instructor? Get more knowledge about the ocean through a professional, internationally recognized, Marine Science Course.
 
Why do we get good grades -  TRACC only offers one A level, Cambridge Marine science 9693 and we get excellent results.
Our record for A grades is 75%.  That's a whole lot of UKAS points if you want to get into uni, or its a good step towards your first year at college.

Scuba diving & Marine science lessons on a beautiful tropical island can get you a real internationally recognised Pre U qualification in a 14 week period of 2017.  The A level starts mid Jan 2017 and ends with the exams in late April.

For more info@tracc-borneo.org
http://tracc.org/marine-science-course-a-level-9693/

More blogs on Marine science class 2016

Island Life Part 3 - What I've learned at TRACC

Underwater Construction

It’s been two and a half weeks since I first arrived at Pom Pom Island and the Everest of a learning curve I experienced in my first week has gradually leveled to that of a steadier linear climb up some Chocolate Hills.

I have learned – The underwater signs for nudibranch, grouper, mating, scorpion fish, and crocodile fish. How to make a hammock. The interesting and fantastically strange and beautiful anatomy of the nudibranch, with fluffy gills, spiky cerata, horn like rhinophores, and in some, a special ability to be “solar powered”. There are two distinct populations of Bajau people, land and sea, and that the sea Bajau make a yearly offering to the spirits of the sea through sending a boatful of land goodies down the river. Many words of Bahasa Malay including gila (crazy), ayo (oh my god - used as a general exclamation), and nakal (naughty). How to use a lift bag to move bottle reefs and crates of collected  

The Blue Dragon nudibranch
Photo by Basil Bohn

coral underwater. That planting coral and tending to artificial reefs is a bit like gardening, but you must plant coral with space in between the species so energy is not expended fighting, but growing. The basics of regulator servicing. How the local whiskey sneaks up to give you a bangin’ hangover. How to sit on the Flying Fish, the TRACC boat, a bit on the tip toes to protect the bum from the sometimes harsh motion of the waves. That although much of the coral is reduced to rubble, there are signs of regeneration everywhere throughout the artificial reef and surrounding area. How to mix cement and hammer underwater. Turtle eggs are surprisingly heavy for their size. A week of care and food can do wonders for a malnourished kitten. How to be a real life Baywatch character through the rescue diving course. There are 3 types of seagrass on the house reef and 1717 know types of seacucumbers in the ocean, some of which have teeth in their anus, and sometimes pearlfish live inside them. How fun and enriching it is to be in a place where everyone is passionate about the ocean in one facet or another. That simple living promotes freedom of time and mind. How small tropical fish will come to explore a freshly planted bottle reef within about 5 minutes.  That even those with 100’s of dives, that dive 6 days a week, are still easily excited and happy to dive everyday. That everyone has a story to tell and a bit of awesome strangeness inside of him or her. And that the life I was living three weeks ago seems like a dream light years away and eons ago.

A Storm Brewing in the Sunset

With such a wide world of ocean, practical skills and experience, and people to know and learn about, I don’t expect my slope of a learning curve will ever accumulate in descent.


Previous blogs Island life 1  -- Island life 2 -- More from Lark

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Shark cave reefs

This week, our Malaysian community workers and our international volunteers have been making shark hiding reefs. This is the TRACC version of proactive marine conservation. Our philosophy is that if we see a problem, then we should work towards a solution.

From the plastic recycler, we aquired a number of large flat trays which were ideal for the roofs for caves for sharks. We attached crate reefs filled with plastic waste (cutup water bottles) which increases the surface area for sponge and cryptic organism settlement as well as providing a myriad of small spaces for post larval and juvenile fish crabs and other tasty small organisms to hide. The design gives a sheltered cave environment similar to the caves we have seen being used by bamboo and coral cat sharks. The upper surface of the cave and the crate supports will be planted with corals which will eventually completely camoflage the artificial reef structure.

During our surveys, it was noted that there was a lot of food for benthic sharks such as coral cat sharks, brown banded bamboo sharks epaulete sharks and nurse or leopard sharks. Unfortunately the sharks are rare if not completely absent from the reefs where we are working. When the proposed new Marine Protected Area, Tun Mustapha Park MPA is finally gazetted then we hope to witness an increase of fish life as the overfishing is brought under control. With sustainable fishing, we should eventually see an increase in small sharks numbers. We hope that a demonstration of the value of community action such as our SGP/GEF project near the Tip of Borneo (Simpang Mengayu) will lead to more projects around the region using the techniques we are developing to improve and rebuild the reefs close to each village.

The whole assembly of the shark cave reefs is fixed to the sea floor by glass bottle reefs attached to each corner. Because of the size the reefs were assembled on land and then taken underwater in pieces. The various parts were put back together and large cable ties were used fix all he components into place. The area of seabed chosen has considerable wave action so the reefs were staked to the seabed using steel rods. A total of 12 shark cave reefs were made and positioned in three different areas.

The finished shark cave reefs look suitable for lobsters as well as bottom living sharks, only time will tell which marine creatures take up residence.