SABC Careers and Training Faire

The African Coelacanth Ecosystem Programme attended 4 of the SABC Careers and Training Faires with the aim of encouraging young people to explore the various careers open to them associated with the marine environment. More than 200 000 pupils passed through the 4 Faires in the 8 days allocated.

We took our life size coelacanth to all the Faires, which was a huge attraction with many of the pupils asking if it was a shark? This was a great way to start introducing them to the coelacanth, our programme and the marine environment. As part of our display a number of examples of rocky shore creatures – starfish, barnacles, hard coral, abalone and various shells were on display  – and many pupils had never before seen anything like these as most had never been to the coast. Many pupils did not associate the shells with animals and when told that various animals inhabited these shells they did not believe us at first.

The careers we discussed ranged from Marine Biology, Oceanography, Geneticists, and various careers in the harbours as well as the careers on the ship such as engineer, captain and cook. At the Johannesburg expo we also had our model of the Jago and this grabbed the attention of many of the boys – some of which said that they would be the one to build South Africa’s first submersible!!!

The biology teachers were not forgotten and they were given posters and a Coastcare Fact File (Department of Environmental Affairs and Forestry) to use in their classrooms and hopefully encourage further interest in the marine environment.

This year the African Coelacanth Ecosystem Programme, together with the Delta Foundation produced a Careers video entitled ‘ Exploring Ocean Careers with Old Fourlegs’ and this was showcased at the Johannesburg Careers Faire.