2026 NMEA Award Winners
Celebrating Excellence in Marine and Aquatic Education
The National Marine Educators Association is proud to recognize this year’s award recipients, honored at the NMEA 2026 Annual Conference, “Meeting of the Waters,” in Cambridge, Maryland. As NMEA celebrates its 50th anniversary, these honorees reflect the same spirit that has driven the organization since its founding: a commitment to making known the world of water, both fresh and salt.
Youth Leadership in Marine Conservation Award
Ally Good and Natalie Conran, Missouri
The 2026 Youth Leadership in Marine Conservation Award for demonstrating passion for protecting marine environments, educating the public about the importance of the marine environment, or advocating for the conservation and protection of marine environments and individual marine species goes to Ally Good and Natalie Conran from St. Louis, Missouri, co-founders of Night at the Aquarium.
Ally Good and Natalie Conran—2026 Youth Leadership in Marine Conservation Award recipients
Growing up in St. Louis, Ally and Natalie had never had direct exposure to ocean conservation until they joined NOAA's Ocean Guardian Youth Ambassador Program. That experience inspired them to found Night at the Aquarium, a program built around a simple but powerful idea: a community can be thousands of miles from the ocean and still shape its health, through the rivers that connect us all.
Through the program, high school students research a marine or conservation topic and present it at community events across the greater St. Louis area. The first cohort in 2025 included 12 students from two high schools. This year, the program has grown to 25 students from five high schools, presenting at venues including the National Association of Biology Teachers' Convention and the St. Louis Aquarium Foundation Gala. Audiences have walked away changing real habits, from rethinking a makeup routine to reconsidering a seafood order, after learning how their choices connect to ocean health. Ally and Natalie have also built partnerships with river conservation groups throughout the region, connected virtually with veterinarians from the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, and reached out to shark researchers as far away as the Bahamas, proving that ocean advocacy can start anywhere there is a river, a classroom, and the will to teach others.
NMEA is proud to honor Ally and Natalie for showing that a passion for ocean conservation can take root anywhere, and for inspiring a new generation of students to see themselves as part of the solution.
OUTSTANDING TEACHER
Dr. Gregory Barord, Iowa
The 2026 Outstanding Teacher Award for effective and innovative classroom teaching goes to Dr. Gregory Barord from Des Moines, Iowa, teacher at Central Campus, Des Moines Public Schools.
Dr. Greg Barord (L)—2026 Outstanding Teacher Award recipient, Pictured with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (R)
More than a thousand miles from the nearest ocean, Dr. Barord's classroom is a student-led marine research facility. His students manage a fully operational saltwater laboratory housing over 130 marine species, rotating through leadership roles in collaborative "Nautilus groups," where every student is trained and every student is expected to teach someone else. Students in his program have co-authored peer-reviewed publications, including original research on stingray ovulation monitoring, all before graduating high school.
Dr. Barord created Central Campus Ocean Week, where students present original research, compete in Ocean Olympics, and team up with culinary arts students for "Dissections for Dinner." He designed and leads an annual UN Ocean Decade-endorsed expedition to Fiji, where students have joined scientists aboard research vessels to survey deep-sea nautilus populations. During the pandemic, when none of that was possible, he brought marine biology to his neighborhood through "Sidewalk Science," chalk lessons that earned him a spot on The Kelly Clarkson Show. Through it all, he has proven that marine science doesn't need an ocean nearby, only a teacher who believes every student is capable of more than they think.
NMEA is proud to honor Dr. Barord for building a classroom, and a community of student scientists, where curiosity about the ocean thrives no matter the distance from the coast.
Marine Education Award
Seaberry Nachbar, California
The 2026 Marine Education Award for distinguished performance in marine education at the local, regional, or national level by professionals who are not classroom teachers goes to Seaberry Nachbar from Carmel, California, Founding Director of NOAA's Bay Watershed Education and Training Program (B-WET) and the Ocean Guardian School Program, and Education Coordinator for the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries.
Seaberry Nachbar (L)—2026 Marine Education Award recipient, pictured with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (R)
For over twenty-five years, Seaberry has provided sustained national leadership in marine and watershed education through NOAA. She played a key role in developing the Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience framework, now a national model for learner-centered, place-based environmental education. Under her leadership, B-WET grew from a regional program that began in Maryland into a national grant-making and professional learning initiative, and she championed a regional model that lets local NOAA offices align marine science education with local ecosystems, cultures, and priorities.
Through the Ocean Guardian School Program, she has given K-12 schools across the country the chance to design their own hands-on stewardship projects, from habitat restoration to marine debris reduction. Combined, her programs have helped tens of thousands of students engage directly with marine and watershed science, and thousands of teachers build the confidence and skills to bring outdoor learning into their classrooms. She has also been a key voice on the California Environmental Literacy Initiative, the only federal agency representative on that statewide effort, helping bring ocean and environmental literacy to scale in the nation's largest state.
NMEA is proud to honor Seaberry for a career defined by building programs that endure, adapt, and reach communities too often left out of marine science education.
Marine Education Award—Outstanding Organization
Ocean Affairs Council Taiwan
The 2026 Marine Education Award for an Outstanding Organization, recognizing outstanding work and leadership by an organization in any aspect of marine education at the local, regional, or national level, goes to the Taiwan Ocean Affairs Council.
Dr. Chung-Ling Chen (President, National Academy of Marine Research; L) accepts the 2026 Marine Education Award for an Outstanding Organization on behalf of the Taiwan Ocean Affairs Council. Pictured with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (R)
Rather than treating marine science education as a standalone policy area, the OAC has elevated it to a national development goal, building what it calls a model national ocean literacy plan. Its Medium- and Long-Term Plan for 2025 through 2028 represents a four-year investment of roughly 13 million U.S. dollars, structured around building a model nation of ocean literacy and upgrading the marine industry workforce. The Council has established a digital ocean literacy academy, developed systematic curricula such as the Ocean Sciences Sequence, and created competency models and leadership training that connect research, teaching, and practice across the country.
In 2025 alone, the OAC and its affiliated agencies delivered more than 770 marine education activities, reaching over 138,000 participants nationwide through educator training, public outreach, conferences, and community learning. The Council has also extended its commitment internationally, hosting the IPMEN 2025 Conference in Kaohsiung, supporting the adoption of the Takao Declaration on global ocean literacy, and sending 21 Taiwanese marine educators to engage directly with the NMEA community, alongside an ongoing collaboration with UC Berkeley to bring the Ocean Sciences Sequence into Taiwan's schools.
NMEA is proud to honor the Ocean Affairs Council for demonstrating what is possible when a nation commits, at scale, to building a culture of ocean literacy.
Johnette D. Bosarge Memorial Award
Mendel Graeber, Alabama
The 2026 Johnette D. Bosarge Memorial Award for an individual's service and dedication to NMEA or the local chapter, loyalty, efficiency, and enthusiasm for marine and aquatic education, and earned respect from their peers goes to Mendel Graeber from Dauphin Island, Alabama, Director of the Alabama Aquarium at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab.
Mendel Graeber (L)—2026 Johnette D. Bosarge Memorial Award recipient, pictured with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (R)
Mendel's first NMEA conference was 22 years ago in St. Petersburg, as a new marine educator with the Dauphin Island Sea Lab's Discovery Hall Program. In the years since, she has stayed connected to NMEA through conferences in Hawaii, through service on the 2013 conference's hospitality committee, and most recently through the 2025 conference planning committee in Lafayette.
During her years with Discovery Hall, Mendel helped build week-long, field-based professional development programs, from Beaches, Birds, and Barrier Islands to Grasses, Groupers, and Gastropods, giving hundreds of K-12 teachers hands-on coastal experiences to bring back to their classrooms. She then moved across the street to what was then the Estuarium, where she built an educational department nearly from scratch: informational kiosks read by thousands of visitors a year, a full rewrite of the K-12 curriculum aligned to Alabama's Course of Study and Ocean Literacy Principles, docent training, and a public excursions program that opened field-based learning to the community for the first time. Mendel wrote every new sign, curated every photo panel, and led the multi-phase renovation that transformed that facility into today's Alabama Aquarium, work she carried through significant personal hardship. She was named Director in early 2025 and also created and still emcees the aquarium's long-running Boardwalk Talk series.
NMEA is proud to honor Mendel for seventeen years of quiet, tireless dedication that embody exactly the spirit this award was created to celebrate.
James Centorino Award
Dr. George Matsumoto, California
The 2026 James Centorino Award for distinguished performance in marine education at a regional and or national level and dedication to marine issues over a career goes to Dr. George Matsumoto from Monterey, California, Senior Education and Research Specialist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI).
Dr. George Matsumoto (L)—2026 James Centorino Award recipient, pictured with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (R)
Since joining MBARI in 1996, George has advanced our scientific understanding of open ocean and deep-sea communities, with particular focus on the ecology, systematics, and evolution of ctenophores and cnidarians, work that has led to the description of multiple new species. But George's impact multiplies through the people he trains. As coordinator of MBARI's summer internship program since the late 1990s, he has connected hundreds of students to cutting-edge marine science and engineering. Since 2003, his EARTH Workshop has brought scientists and classroom educators together every year, helping teachers turn real-time oceanographic data into meaningful K-12 lessons, with travel support and stipends so that cost is never a barrier to participation.
George helped develop the Ocean Literacy Scope and Sequence for Grades K-12, a framework that reshaped how ocean science is taught nationwide. His support for the GO-BGC profiling float array brings real-time ocean chemistry into classrooms, and his service on multiple National Academies of Sciences committees reflects his belief that equity and scientific progress go hand in hand. As co-chair of NMEA's Traditional Knowledge Committee, he has helped ensure that Indigenous and community-based ways of knowing are woven into marine education practice. A dedicated NMEA member since 2003, George has served as a Board Director from 2010 to 2016 and as a longtime reviewer for Current, The Journal of Marine Education.
NMEA is proud to honor George for a career that shows rigorous science and inspired teaching are not competing priorities, but two halves of the same calling.
President’s Award
Tara Hicks Johnson, New Hampshire
The 2026 President’s Award, given by the current President of NMEA Tami Lunsford, based on outstanding contributions to NMEA and/or marine education goes to Tara Hicks Johnson, NMEA Past President and Chair of the Strategic Partnerships Committee.
Tara Hicks Johnson (R)—2026 Presidnet’s Award recipient, with NMEA President Tami Lunsford (L)
NMEA President Tami Lunsford presented the award with the following statement: “I truly could not think of a more deserving person than our past president, Tara Hicks Johnson. She is the most dedicated, passionate leader I have had the pleasure of working with. She is a powerhouse of energy, vision, and drive, and she accomplishes more for our organization and our field in a week than most people do in a year…and she does it all with Canadian calm, kindness, and patience. Seriously - dealing with me AND JACKIE weekly is not for the weak of heart (you can ask David Christopher), and she never loses her cool. Whether she is dolled up at a PRADA event, on the water, or cleaning up a mess, she jumps right in and does whatever needs to be done.
“She was absolutely the right person to lead us into this new era for the organization, and I am so grateful that she has taken on the strategic partnerships committee and is going to continue chairing that work as she steps off the Presidents Chain and her role as a voting board member.”