HomeMy WebLinkAboutUW Approved Proposal_NPC MRC RFP 2025-27 (Parrish_Dead Birds Intern)1. Name of Project: Dead birds build life experience: A COASST internship program for youth
community science
2. Lead organiza�on and Contact:
Julia K. Parrish, Execu�ve Director, COASST
jparrish@uw.edu
206-221-5787
University of Washington
Box 355020
Seatle, WA 98195
3. Start and End Dates for Project: August 2025 – December 2026
4. Deliverables:
Sound Science
• at least 24 beached bird surveys (monthly at 2 beaches) resul�ng in data addi�on to the
COASST dataset
Education
• 2 COASST trainings in community
• at least 4 highschool interns from Quileute School trained and prac�ced in STEM techniques
(rigorous search and survey, data collec�on, bird iden�fica�on, data entry)
• highschool-college intern networking
• highschool intern professional development through UW Seatle campus visit (tours of
research labs and COASST offices, interac�ons with COASST undergraduate interns and
tribal communi�es on campus, visit to wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ – Intellectual House)
Outreach
• highschool intern community presenta�on about their COASST experience
• highschool intern training assistance, as local beach experts
• Newsleter Ar�cle for MRC and 5 quality photographs (upon request)
• Final report
5. Project Staff:
Dr. Julia Parrish is the founder and Execu�ve Director of COASST. She has over 30 years of teaching,
program development and marine science experience, and has trained thousands of COASST
volunteers. Parrish will supervise the project, including budgetary responsibility and will coordinate
with College staff to help arrange the MRC intern campus visit (no salary requested)
Ms. Florence Sullivan is the COASST Science Coordinator. She has over 10 years marine science
experience, including working for non-profit, academic, and federal agency research groups. Sullivan
will supervise interns in partnership with teachers, lead in-community trainings, interface with
partners, and provide MRC repor�ng and other communica�on deliverables as requested.
Ms. Allie Brown is the COASST Par�cipant and Intern Coordinator. With experience working directly
with the public, Brown has developed a variety of outreach materials, and delivered hands-on
trainings. Brown supervises the COASST undergraduate intern program, schedules all trainings, and
will work with the Dean's Office to schedule the MRC intern UW campus visit (no salary requested).
Mr. Charlie Wright is the COASST Data Verifier, with over 15 years of experience with COASST, and
more than 30 as a master birder. Wright will verify MRC intern iden�fica�ons (or their data sheets)
and provide feedback to assist in learning (no salary requested).
6. Partners:
Alice Ryan is a trained COASST par�cipant and 7-12 Science Teacher at the Quileute Tribal School.
Alice supervised high school students in the first two years of this project (2022-23, 2024-2025), and
will serve as a COASST liaison (and MRC mentor) for interns based in La Push, WA.
John Hunter is a trained COASST par�cipant who has worked on previous COASST MRC projects with
local Forks School District students, and served in an advisory role in the pilot year of this internship
(22-23). He will serve as liaison for any interns and teachers based in Forks, WA, and connect the
program with the MRC and NMEA marine educators.
7. Geographic Area:
COASST trains and supports volunteer beach walkers in Clallam and Jefferson coun�es. These
volunteers collect data at beach sites along the outer coast and the western mouth of the Strait of
Juan de Fuca. The last two cohorts of MRC supported interns have monitored First Beach, La Push
(Star on Figure 1) during monthly surveys. This project will con�nue that monitoring effort.
Figure 1. COASST beached bird monitoring sites along the north outer coast of Washington and Strait of
Juan de Fuca. Points in blue are currently assigned to survey teams for monthly surveys, while green
points haven’t been monitored in several years. Starred location indicates First Beach, La Push, where
interns will survey.
8. Permits:
COASST holds a Scien�fic Research and Collec�ng Permit from Olympic Na�onal Park, enabling
COASST par�cipants to survey coastal beaches parkwide. Sites within the Quileute lands are
approved for survey by residents only (including students). An MOU with the Quileute Tribe has
been secured, with support and guidance by Alice Ryan.
9. Project Narra�ve: (up to 5 pages not including atachments)
a. Abstract: Provide a 1-2 paragraph project summary in the form of a short descrip�on that
highlights the narra�ve that follows.
This project aims to deepen coastal community �es with an established ci�zen science program, the
Coastal Observa�on and Seabird Survey Team (COASST), through a paid youth internship. The internship
gives par�cipants from small coastal communi�es in Jefferson and Clallam coun�es the opportunity to
gain experience conduc�ng environmental research as part of COASST’s established beached bird survey
program. Building on the success of two previous cohorts of interns, we will recruit two teams of two
high school students/recent highschool graduates to adopt a local beach and conduct monthly surveys.
Interns will be trained by COASST staff, have regular check ins with COASST staff and a local
mentor/teacher, tour the University of Washington mid year, and share their experience at a COASST
training held in their community at the end of the internship. The COASST dataset is used by scien�sts
and resource managers as a metric for measuring changes in the local and global environment –
including impacts from harmful algal blooms, oil spills, and changing ocean temperatures. Long term
sustainability of the COASST dataset on the outer Washington coast depends on strong connec�ons to
community. This internship program is an opportunity (1) for coastal youth to explore a STEM career
pathway, and build career-relevant skills, (2) for COASST to strengthen exis�ng rela�onships with local
teachers and community members, and (3) to ensure con�nuity of COASST’s beached bird data set in an
area prone to spa�al and temporal gaps in the record.
b. Describe the background and context: project area, situa�on to be addressed, past work
relevant to the project.
COASST is a longstanding ci�zen science program, invi�ng coastal community members to par�cipate in
ecosystem monitoring through monthly surveys of beach cast birds. Currently, ~500 coastal ci�zens from
Northern California to Alaska collect data; including at 47 sites along the outer coast of Washington.
COASST trains coastal residents to follow a rigorous protocol focused on a standardized search technique
and use of a specialized key to iden�fy bird carcasses found. All carcasses are iden�fied to the lowest
possible taxa (ideally, species), tagged, photographed, and le� on the beach.
Many COASST volunteers have par�cipated in the program for years, becoming guardians of highly local
ecological knowledge, with direct experience of changing ecological baselines, empowering them to act
as environmental stewards and advocates for their communi�es and ecosystems.
Over the life�me of the program, COASST has amassed a dataset of >100,000 beached bird carcasses
(210 species). COASST data have been used to establish a baseline of what is ‘normal’ along the Pacific
Northwest coast. COASST and other marine scien�sts and resource managers use the baseline to iden�fy
significant departures, most usually an increase in carcass deposi�on. The largest of these are termed
"mass mortality events." When these extreme events happen, COASST works with other scien�sts,
resource managers and community members to provide a sta�s�cally bounded es�mate of the total
mortality (o�en in the hundreds of thousands of bids), and to atempt to determine the cause of the
event. This highly collabora�ve work has led to a number of peer-reviewed publica�ons in the scien�fic
literature including documen�ng impacts of climate change (Jones et al., 2025; Parrish et al., 2007),
harmful algal blooms (Jones et al., 2017) and marine heatwaves (Jones et al., 2018, 2024; Piat et al.,
2020). COASST data are also used in natural resource management annual assessments of marine
environmental health (e.g. California Current Integrated Ecosystem Assessment; ODFW Status Review of
the Marbled Murrelet 2017).
The social, economic and cultural fabric of coastal communi�es is being tested by the compounding
stresses of a warming ocean and atmosphere, ocean acidifica�on, range shi�s of na�ve and invasive
species, harmful algal blooms, coastal erosion, oil spills, loss of fisheries such as salmon and crab, and
more. Central to COASST’s mission is the idea that collabora�on makes science stronger, and that coastal
community members are essen�al partners in monitoring marine ecosystem health. Many of the small
communi�es we work with are situated in remote loca�ons, far from each other, and thus inaccessible
to a single scien�st. COASST’s distributed network of dedicated ci�zen scien�sts ensures these deeply
important sites can be monitored. Indeed, these engaged community members have historically
provided the only available datasets for large seabird mortality events in remote regions. However, living
in these remote communi�es comes with many challenges, and community members seldom have �me
to spend volunteering for a ci�zen science project. COASST is commited to long-term, place-based,
reciprocal rela�onships with our members. As such, we seek funding to provide support to our
communi�es, par�cularly youth par�cipants who could benefit from the experience of hands-on science
and ecosystem monitoring efforts.
c. Explain why the project is appropriate for MRC funding or how it achieves one or more of
the six benchmarks (See Appendix A atached).
As work specifically eleva�ng highschool students in STEM training and professional development, while
contribu�ng to a long-term highly rigorous, publicly accessible database, this proposal blends the
benchmarks of Sound Science with Education and Outreach. By contribu�ng high quality data from sites
otherwise inaccessible (i.e., on the Quileute reserva�on), the interns will contribute to a long-term,
ecological monitoring dataset that is ac�vely used to inves�gate the health of the marine environment.
These data are incorporated into peer-reviewed scien�fic publica�ons. (Note that COASST does not
provide data from individual sites within tribal ownership unless we have permission to do so from the
tribal government. We do bundle those data points together with many other sites within the same
geographic area to create larger-scale paterns.)
Interns will be trained, and mentored, in the collec�on of high quality data, with feedback from the
COASST data verifier on their deduc�ve abili�es (i.e., the species iden�fica�on). Through pa�ent,
ongoing prac�ce of their monthly surveys, interns will come to learn the process of scien�fic data
collec�on. They will engage in professional development (see University of Washington campus visit,
sec�on F) and be encouraged to share their science by engaging with community members they may
encounter on the beach during their surveys; explaining what they are doing and what they have
learned. Finally, interns will have the opportunity to reflect and share their experience at the COASST
community beached birds training at the end of the internship.
d. List and describe the project objec�ve(s).
Project objec�ves include:
Recruit, train, mentor and provide professional development for 4 pre-college coastal youth community
members with the aim of enhancing their STEM career choices through locally mentored science.
Gain data from otherwise inaccessible sites to add to the COASST database, with the goal of more
completely capturing Pacific Northwest marine bird mortality paterns as an indicator of coastal
ecosystem health.
e. Provide a �meline for your project ac�vi�es in rela�on to your stated objec�ves and the
deliverables iden�fied in #4 above.
Milestone Activity/Deliverable
August 2025 Begin search for interns, leveraging Alice Ryan/COASST partner/MRC mentor
connections
October 2025 Complete hiring process and conduct initial training workshops in-community;
including training for interns and interested community members
October 2025 -
October 2026
Interns complete monthly surveys.
Monthly check ins between COASST and interns to submit survey data
December 2025 Check in call with Alice Ryan/COASST Staff
March 2026 Check in call with Alice Ryan/COASST Staff
March 2026 Host interns and Alice Ryan at UW for in-person tour of COASST/UW Programs
June 2026 Check in call with Alice Ryan/COASST Staff
September 2026 Check in call with Alice Ryan/COASST Staff
October 2026 End-of-internship workshop in community, including interns sharing of
experience. Final stipends paid out
December 2026 Final Report
f. Describe the methods, procedures and equipment to be used, if any.
Intern Recruitment, Training and Mentorship
COASST and Alice Ryan, the 7-12 Science Teacher at the Quileute Tribal School, have now guided two
cohorts of students through a paid internship program (2 students 2022-2023, 4 students 2024-2025),
providing a hands-on experience of a possible STEM career path for young members of tribal and coastal
communi�es, and encouraging environmental stewardship through engagement in ci�zen science. This
proposal aims to secure funding for a new cohort of 4 students to complete a COASST beached birds
internship. Interns will be hired in pairs to ensure that best safety prac�ces are followed while surveying
beaches near La Push in all months of the year (likely First, Second and Third beaches).
Alice will assist in recrui�ng interns from her school, and will host COASST research staff to provide a 5-
hour, in-person training workshop for the interns at the beginning of the internship period. At this
training, interns will learn to conduct a standardized survey of the beach, document the condi�ons of
the beach, and measure, iden�fy and tag any bird carcasses found using the COASST beached bird guide
and toolkit. The COASST beached bird survey module features repeated (monthly) sampling to hone
skills, encouraging par�cipants to gain awareness, knowledge and understanding at mul�ple scales
(individual item found; paterns on a specific beach; paterns across the program). Through this
internship, interns will learn standardized survey design and data collec�on as well as use of the metric
system, measurement techniques and the interac�on between scale and precision. During the training,
interns will receive their survey kits, and conduct a prac�ce survey along First Beach, La Push with
COASST staff and mentors. The protocol followed by the interns is iden�cal to the larger COASST
program, making the data they collect fully interoperable with the COASST data.
Online data submission reinforces cri�cal computer skills and communica�on prac�ces necessary for
future employment. Interns will also be trained in data entry through interac�on with Alice, and
remotely with the COASST Science Coordinator (Florence Sullivan). Intern data will be electronically
received by COASST UW interns, allowing these college-age interns and the MRC interns to interact.
Finally, MRC intern bird carcass iden�fica�ons will be validated by the COASST Data Verifier (Charlie
Wright), with all incomplete or incorrect iden�fica�ons flagged such that Charlie or Florence can
provided feedback.
Repeated surveys on the same beach deepens interns' understanding of natural paterns and
environmental change in their local community environment. At the end of the internship, interns will
atend a second 5-hour, in-person, beached bird training workshop intended for local community
members (with tribal permission to survey) and act as expert co-hosts/teaching assistants with COASST
research staff. Prior to the community workshop, COASST staff will work with each intern team to reflect
on their experience, the data they collected, and to help them summarize their internship for
presenta�on back to their community. Intern reflec�ons will also be summarized in COASST’s final
report.
Intern Time Commitment
Surveys will last 2-4 hours on average, and will take place monthly (allowing for cancella�ons due to
weather and/or safety issues). Data submission following each survey will take an addi�onal .5-1 hour,
depending on the number of birds found. An addi�onal �me commitment will be required to atend in-
community training workshops at the beginning and end of the internship, and travel to the University of
Washington for a campus visit to explore STEM degree programs and career pathways mid-internship.
Intern Local Mentoring
Alice Ryan will act as a local mentor to offer support, recommenda�ons, and reminders as needed
throughout the year. Should students be recruited from outside Quileute Tribal School (e.g., Forks
Highschool), long �me COASST partner John Hunter is also available to act as a mentor. Should students
from Neah Bay or Clallam Bay schools show interest, COASST will seek local teacher support.
In-community mentors, such as local science teachers, are cri�cally important for keeping students
engaged and responsive when the pressures of school and life make it temp�ng not to complete surveys.
The mentor will not be required to accompany the interns on each survey, unless this is specifically
requested by the interns and/or decided at the outset for a par�cular beach loca�on. Mentors will be
invited to all training workshops and mee�ngs that are required for interns, but need not atend every
event. They will be invited (and funded) to atend the University of Washington campus visit. And as key
local resources they will be asked for advice in the recruitment of interns, organiza�on and �ming of
intern trainings and the beached birds community workshop. In addi�on, quarterly communica�on
between COASST staff and mentors will ensure that the internship runs smoothly.
Intern Remote Mentoring and Networking
COASST staff will offer remote support for interns, with monthly check-ins to help connect MRC interns
to each other and any resources they may need. MRC interns and COASST undergraduate interns will
interact during reciprocal visits between UW campus and La Push, as well as over email during monthly
data uploads. Regular connec�ons with COASST staff and campus-based undergraduate interns will
create an intern network, and will showcase the possibility of STEM career paths MRC interns could
pursue, returning to serve their communi�es. When MRC interns visit the UW main campus, they will
also connect with STEM degree program advisors, the tribal community centered around wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ –
Intellectual House, and par�cipate in guided tours of research labs and resources such as the UW Fish
Collec�on.
g. Describe the extent or impact of the project (e.g., acres, miles, number of ci�zens).
This paid internship will reduce the financial hardships typically associated with unpaid internships, and
enable four coastal youth to explore a STEM career pathway. Previous interns have reported that
without the compe��ve s�pend, they would not have been able to par�cipate in the program. (See
sec�on F for further internship details). The reciprocal visits between undergraduate COASST interns to
La Push and MRC interns to UW campus will build peer networks, and expose each set of interns to
different communi�es. MRC interns will also gain experience of a college campus through their visit to
COASST and other campus programs at the University of Washington Seatle campus.
This project also strengthens the COASST dataset by contribu�ng 24 surveys (12 for each pair of interns),
ensuring con�nuity of an extremely valuable dataset that has historically had temporal or spa�al gaps in
the record along the Washington outer coast.
This project also provides a structure from which interns and their teacher/mentors may develop spinoff
projects related to data collec�on on beached birds – providing addi�onal opportuni�es to students
beyond the ac�vi�es of four interns conduc�ng surveys. In the pilot year of the study, mentor Alice Ryan
began a project with a high school biology class to document the impacts of light pollu�on on the marine
birds that they saw stranded in the courtyard at their school, using COASST data collec�on and bird
iden�fica�on prac�ces as a founda�on. COASST acted in an advisory role as the students led data
collec�on, summary, and presenta�on of this stranded birds research project. The internship partnership
was able to foster interest in real-world data collec�on even beyond the core goals of the COASST
program. Work from this partnership was presented at the Na�onal Marine Educators Associa�on
conference in Bellingham, WA in July 2023.
h. Indicate if there are plans to con�nue the project into the future.
Con�nuing a coastal highschool intern program is a priority for COASST. Alice Ryan and the Quileute
Tribal School are a strong founda�on from which to con�nue this work. As funding allows, COASST may
atempt to expand this program to other communi�es, including Neah Bay.
REFERENCES
Jones, T., Parrish, J. K., Lindsey, J., Wright, C., Burgess, H. K., Dolliver, J., Divine, L., Kaler, R., Bradley, D.,
Sorenson, G., Torrenta, R., Backensto, S., Cole�, H., Harvey, J. T., Nevins, H. M., Donnelly-
Greenan, E., Sherer, D. L., Roleto, J., & Lindquist, K. (2024). Marine bird mass mortality events as
an indicator of the impacts of ocean warming. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 737, 161–181.
htps://doi.org/10.3354/meps14330
Jones, T., Parrish, J. K., MacCready, P., Ballance, L. T., Bradley, D. W., Burgess, H. K., Dolliver, J. E., Harvey, J.
T., Joyce, T., Lindquist, K., Lindsey, J., Nevins, H. M., Roleto, J., Wilson, L., & Wright, C. (2025).
Assessing total mortality following seabird wrecks given variable data quan�ty and quality: The
Cassin’s auklet die-off. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, 82, 1–22.
htps://doi.org/10.1139/cjfas-2023-0382
Jones, T., Parrish, J. K., Peterson, W. T., Bjorkstedt, E. P., Bond, N. A., Ballance, L. T., Bowes, V., Hipfner, J.
M., Burgess, H. K., Dolliver, J. E., Lindquist, K., Lindsey, J., Nevins, H. M., Robertson, R. R., Roleto,
J., Wilson, L., Joyce, T., & Harvey, J. (2018). Massive Mortality of a Plank�vorous Seabird in
Response to a Marine Heatwave. Geophysical Research Letters, 45(7), 3193–3202.
htps://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL076164
Jones, T., Parrish, J. K., Punt, A. E., Trainer, V. L., Kudela, R., Lang, J., Brancato, M. S., Odell, A., & Hickey, B.
(2017). Mass mortality of marine birds in the Northeast Pacific caused by Akashiwo sanguinea.
Marine Ecology Progress Series, 579, 111–127. htps://doi.org/10.3354/meps12253
Parrish, J., Bond, N., Nevins, H., Mantua, N., Loeffel, R., Peterson, W., & Harvey, J. (2007). Beached birds
and physical forcing in the California Current System. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 352, 275–
288. htps://doi.org/10.3354/meps07077
Piat, J. F., Parrish, J. K., Renner, H. M., Schoen, S. K., Jones, T. T., Arimitsu, M. L., Kuletz, K. J., Bodenstein,
B., García-Reyes, M., Duerr, R. S., Corcoran, R. M., Kaler, R. S. A., McChesney, G. J., Golightly, R. T.,
Cole�, H. A., Suryan, R. M., Burgess, H. K., Lindsey, J., Lindquist, K., … Sydeman, W. J. (2020).
Extreme mortality and reproduc�ve failure of common murres resul�ng from the northeast
Pacific marine heatwave of 2014-2016. PLOS ONE, 15(1), e0226087.
htps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0226087
10. Project Budget & Jus�fica�on:
Category Detail MRC
Request Total
Salaries or Hourly Wages and
Benefits 6,648
Science Coordinator Salary and
benefits
Base salary $6500, 32.4 % benefits rate. 3%
inflation applied. 0.75 months committed
($5021 salary / $1627 benefits)
6,648
Supplies and Materials 110
Survey kits 2 kits, $55 each 110
Travel 1,178
Staff travel to training events
travel for COASST staff from Seattle to
coastal communities, twice (Meal, Lodging,
Mileage)
1,178
Other Direct Costs 8,137
Participant Support Costs (non-
UW employee and non-trainer)
stipends for 4 interns $1,500/ea ($6,000),
travel for 6 people (4 interns + 2 teacher
mentors) from Clallam/Jefferson counties to
Seattle: 2 days meals ($92*6 people*2 days
= $1,104), 3 rooms lodging ($188/night*3
rooms = $564), mileage for 2 vehicles
($0.67/mile*300 miles roundtrip*2 vehicles
= $402) and WA ferry fees ($33.45*2 =
$66.90)
8,137
Indirect expenses (All such
expenses should be itemized) 4,404
Salaries or Hourly Wages and
Benefits
indirect costs associated with staff salaries
and benefits 3,690
Supplies and Materials indirect costs associated with producing
survey kits 61
Travel indirect costs associated with UW employee
travel 653
Participant Support Costs (non-
UW employee and non-trainer)
indirect costs associated with participant
support costs: none 0
Totals 20,477