SEA – Science Education and Art – lessons learned from an interdisciplinary conference

The seas and oceans cover 70% of the planet and are critical resources for humanity. Responsibly harnessing the seas and oceans while conserving them for future generations requires a deep understanding of the oceans and, potentially, necessitates major changes in how we (as humanity) interact with them. How do we form a bond between people and the sea? What is the role of maritime education and outreach? Do we need to forge an emotional bond (“a love for the sea”), and what are the roles of scientists, artists and educators in forging this bond? How can we engage different communities, creatively overcoming cultural, technological and financial barriers? These are some of the questions that were posed at the 8th Haifa Conference on Mediterranean Sea Research of the Leon H. Charney School of Marine Sciences at the University of Haifa, Israel (July 14-15^th, 2021) dedicated to the combination of marine research, science education and art. While art is often used as a means for making research accessible to the public, the aim here was to create a dialog and perhaps a joint outcome between the disciplines. To achieve this goal, five groups of three individuals that included a scientist, educator and artist who deal with similar topics in their daily practice, but from very different perspectives, were formed. These joint topics (time, communication, sound, vision and education) formed the core topical sessions of the conference. The conversations between the individuals were filmed, edited and shown during the conference and each group was invited to present their findings during the first day of the conference. A poster session was set up to allow creative, artistic ideas to be submitted by students who were asked to think about how to present their research outside the box. The conference was broadcast live across the globe on social media simultaneously in English, Hebrew and Arabic (many of the talks are available at https://www.seahaifa2021.com/).  The second day of the conference was devoted entirely to community activities that took place across the country and were open to the general public. These ranged from lectures at the Maritime museum to a workshop on how to make bread from seaweed. The methodology developed for this conference, its results and some thoughts for future activities will be presented here.