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CIMAR devotes personnel time and funding for educational opportunities for students from K–12 up through postgraduate research training.
CIMAR researchers participate in elementary, middle, and high school career and science day events. Subject areas include cetacean research; protection of Hawaiian monk seals; marine turtle biology and ecology; coral reef ecosystem health and vitality; fish and fisheries research; shark and other bycatch mortality; and marine debris impacts on our environment.
The PIFSC Young Scientist Opportunity (PYSO) Summer Intern Program is a primary educational initiative sponsored by CIMAR. The PYSO is a collaborative program between PIFSC and CIMAR that offers several qualified students the opportunity to acquire professional research experience and training during the summer under the mentorship of selected PIFSC and CIMAR researchers at PIFSC. Four university undergraduate student interns, recruited in a competitive national process, are being hosted virtually.
Argo floats prepared by CIMAR staff at NOAA/PMEL are deployed regularly by undergraduate college students from the SSV Robert C. Seamans of the Sea Education Association and occasionally by cadets from the TS Golden Bear of the California Maritime Academy. These deployments involve students in a global ocean observing system, which both institutions value.


CIMAR projects regularly hire University of Hawai‘i undergraduate students to work on projects as paid workers. Other UH undergraduates participate in projects as volunteers.
CIMAR projects support several Graduate Assistants, primarily at the University of Hawai‘i. All are pursuing Masters or PhD degrees in oceanography, marine sciences, or social sciences. Their research includes such topics as the kinematics and dynamics of short- and long-period gravity waves that periodically produce coastal flooding along West Maui; and the effects of environmental influences (e.g., ENSO; Madden-Julian Oscillation; low-level vorticity; relative humidity) on the characteristics of central and eastern Pacific cyclones.
CIMAR programs support continuing education through the hiring of talented Postdoctoral Researchers. Their research includes such topics as: unraveling the links between El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and Hawai‘i rainfall, e.g., transition diversity and precursors, and hydroclimate impacts of different ENSO types; and the evolution of the internal tide, including its nonlinear byproducts, in environmental settings appropriate to Hawai‘i and specific mid-latitude locations.
CIMAR researchers contribute to education and communication at UH by presenting talks at regular seminar series and teaching courses or individual classes as expert researchers at various campuses in the UH system. Seminars presented by CIMAR and federal researchers at PIFSC are also web-streamed to interested researchers and students at UH.