The OOI Ocean Data Labs Project

The National Science Foundation’s Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) is advancing our ability to understand the natural world by collecting large quantities of data to address complex oceanographic processes. This expanded access to data also provides professors in the geosciences with new opportunities to engage undergraduate students in authentic data experiences using real-world data sets to teach geoscience processes.

However, students struggle to work with data based on their limited experience and exposure to different data types and sources. Also, supporting students in engaging with the data can be challenging for professors too, as there is a lack of adequate tools to easily digest and manipulate large data sets for in-class learning experiences.

Therefore, the OOI Ocean Data Labs Project (formerly called Data Explorations), with funding from NSF, is developing, testing, refining, and disseminating easy to use, interactive Data Explorations and Data Lab Notebooks that will allow undergraduates to use authentic data in accessible ways while being easy for professors to integrate into their teaching.

  • Attendees at our 2019 workshop in Bellingham, WA.
  • Participants at our workshop during the 2019 Earth Educators Rendezvous in Nashville.
  • OSM20 Data Lab Workshop table group
  • Data Lab workshop participants at Western Washington University.
  • Sage chats with several Ocean Sciences workshop participants.
  • Participants at our 2020 Ocean Sciences Data Labs workshop.
  • A table of participants at our Ocean Sciences Workshop hard at work checking out some new Data Explorations.
  • July workshop participants use a bright window to compare multiple graphs on top of each other
  • Participants from our July OOI Data Lab Development Workshop
  • Participants from our June OOI Data Lab Development Workshop
  • The March 2019 OOI Data Labs workshop featured 20 participants and staff from around the country.
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Recent Blog Posts

USGS WaterWatch Web Site

Blog Roundup #1 – Ocean Science and More

I hope to occasionally share some of my favorite web sites and blogs in easily digestible chunks. This first roundup features some of the top sites on ocean, climate and environmental data and science.
Conductance vs. Streamflow on the Delaware River at Trenton, NJ
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Streamflow and Conductance on the Delaware

Conductance is an important measurement of water quality in rivers, and it is often related to river discharge.
Streamflow over the course of 2012 from the USGS streamgage in Trenton, NJ
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RTD Activity Idea: Monitoring Streamflow

The USGS's National Water Information System provides data that is easily accessible to students, allowing them to investigate real-time river conditions at nearby locations or across the nation.
A 1-year graph of river flow on the Delaware River at Trenton NJ
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Streamflow on the Delaware

While temperature, pressure or humidity change with more predictable variation throughout the course of a year, streamflow is more closely correlated with major rain and snow events that occur sporadically throughout the year, often in large doses.
A map of the Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service (AHPS) river forecasts
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Observations and Forecasts of River Floods

Every time it rains there is a potential for flooding to occur. The National Weather Services' Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service (AHPS) analyzes data and models to issue forecasts of potential flooding events.
USGS WaterWatch Web Site
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USGS WaterWatch

Thanks to a network of over 3,000 stream gages monitored by the U.S. Geological Survey, and the WaterWatch web site, we can easily study how rain and snow impact local streams, rivers and estuaries.