REEF campus director Jill Kuehnert surveys reef fish throughout a dive off Key Largo. She has accomplished greater than 30 surveys as a part of REEF’s Volunteer Fish Survey Venture, which helps construct one of many largest marine life databases on this planet. (Photograph Courtesy of Jill Kuehnert)
Jill Kuehnert, the campus director of Key Largo-based Reef Environmental Training Basis (REEF), is a self-described “fish nerd wannabe.” She’s so captivated with fish that at any time when she scuba dives, she tracks, counts and paperwork them to help with the preservation and conservation of species.
“Fish nerds are like fowl watchers,” Kuehnert mentioned. “When you get began you may’t cease.”
Eighteen months in the past, Kuehnert dived proper in to supervise the administration of REEF’s Key Largo campus. The expanded facility consists of its all-new two-story $6 million, 4,000-square foot REEF Ocean Exploration Middle for Marine Conservation.
Unveiled on June 7-8 to coincide with World Ocean Day, the brand new attraction is open to the general public, six days every week, freed from cost. And in response to the muse’s officers, it marks a significant milestone within the basis’s dedication to coach and encourage.
As REEF’s campus director in Key Largo, Jill Kuehnert blends science, outreach, and fervour to encourage the subsequent technology of ocean stewards and reef protectors. (Photograph courtesy of Jill Kuehnert)
“The Ocean Exploration Middle represents a brand new chapter for REEF, aiming to supply an interactive and immersive expertise for guests and Keys residents,” mentioned
Marta Bonatz, chair of REEF’s board of trustees. She’s equally impressed with the outreach Kuehnert has executed to amplify the significance of marine life.
“Jill’s abilities in public talking and neighborhood outreach, coupled together with her steadfast and affected person demeanor make her a super consultant as we attain a broader viewers,” Bonatz defined. “This permits us to foster a deeper understanding and appreciation of the marine surroundings amongst residents and guests to the Florida Keys.”
REEF’s expanded facility includes a up to date, state-of-the-art ocean exploration gallery, a floor-to-ceiling centerpiece with colourful life-size molds of varied Keys fish, works by rotating native artists and a science discovery classroom. The venue additionally serves as a gathering house and may host small teams and conferences. Kuehnert believes this affords the proper platform to have interaction with all issues marine.
“It’s a novel alternative for folks to study our reef with an emphasis on fish,” Kuehnert mentioned.
REEF’s key mission — facilitating packages that actively contain divers, snorkelers and reef lovers in marine conservation — is completed partly by its Volunteer Fish Survey Venture, producing one of many world’s largest marine life databases.
The ‘citizen science’ venture, launched in 1993, has surpassed greater than 300,000 surveys, performed by 17,000 international volunteer divers and snorkelers at practically 18,000 world ocean websites. Kuehnert has performed greater than 30 surveys.
REEF additionally organizes a variety of area survey journeys. This yr, upcoming dive journeys embrace prime locations like Roatan, Honduras; Fernando de Noronha, Brazil; El Hierro, Canary Islands, Spain; South Sulawesi, Indonesia; Anilao, Philippines; Curacao, Cozumel, Mexico; and Cayman Brac, Cayman Islands.
Jill Kuehnert and the REEF group have interaction with the general public at a neighborhood outreach occasion, sharing their ardour for marine conservation and galvanizing ocean stewardship all through the Florida Keys. (Photograph courtesy of Jill Kuehnert)
Welcoming guests to the Florida Keys, whereas supporting marine conservation efforts all through the globe, takes a group of devoted professionals. That’s why REEF helps greater than a dozen workers, fellows and interns.
To be taught why Kuehnert loves the ocean, diving and marine life a lot, you should know the place she got here from. She grew up in Atlanta and graduated from American College in Washington, D.C., incomes an undergraduate diploma in worldwide relations with a deal with Europe, and a grasp’s diploma in philosophy and social coverage, specializing in environmental ethics.
Her post-college profession started at World Financial institution Group in Washington, D.C., conducting agricultural outreach in Asia and Africa.
For a decade, she labored in Singapore because the regional Asia-Pacific head of presidency and public affairs for Monsanto Co., the previous international producer of agricultural, biochemical and chemical merchandise. From 2007 to 2023, Jill labored as a science communications guide for public sector agriculture analysis tasks.
It was at a celebration in Singapore that she met future husband Glenn Wright, a dive grasp hailing from South Africa. The 2 bonded in a dialogue about scuba diving; on the time, nonetheless, Kuehnert was not but a diver.
After deciding to maneuver to South Florida, the couple based and operated a customized dive enterprise known as Fortunate Fish Scuba, for 5 years in Key Largo.
“We had simply as a lot enjoyable taking folks to snorkel within the mangroves and bayside sunsets as we did out to the reef,” she recalled.
Kuehnert just lately wrapped up a three-year time period as president of the Higher Keys Enterprise and Skilled Girls (BPW), rising the group to develop into Florida’s largest chapter with greater than 100 members. And it’s her tenacious spirit that has colleagues singing her praises.
“Jill turns imaginative and prescient into vibrant actuality. Her perception, heat and can-do spirit make her the pal, chief, and neighborhood champion everybody hopes to have by their aspect,” mentioned Key Largo resident Bonnie Barnes, the Higher Keys PBW’s new president-elect and Monroe County program supervisor for Florida Worldwide College’s Small Enterprise Growth Middle.
“Jill is a pure chief who leads by instance, with integrity and quiet power,” mentioned Suzi Youngberg, president of the Key Largo Chamber of Commerce.
“She’s not one to do something midway — when she commits to one thing, she provides it her all,” Youngberg added. “Jill additionally has a delicate, encouraging approach of serving to construct a neighborhood of people that care simply as deeply as she does.”
Within the Florida Keys, REEF oversees quite a lot of occasions together with the annual REEF Fest, slated for Thursday, October 16 to Sunday, October 19; and the Florida Keys Lionfish Derby & Arts Pageant, held yearly in April.
Keys Traveler (KT): When did you first come to the Florida Keys and why?
Jill Kuehnert: As a vacationer and visiting as soon as a decade: within the ‘80s, ‘90s and 2000s. In 2017, I moved to Key Largo with my husband, Glenn. After residing in Singapore, we wished to dwell someplace we might dive (and be heat) year-round. At first, we settled in Fort Lauderdale, however realized we wished to be nearer to the reef.
KT: What features of the Keys’ surroundings or lifestyle matter most to you?
JK: I like the water on each side: ocean and bay. What issues most to me is the neighborhood. I haven’t lived in every other small cities or rural areas, and it took a while to regulate! However now I like operating into folks in every single place I am going like at neighborhood occasions to boost consciousness and construct help for environmental points, or in our social golf equipment and organizations.
KT: What impressed you to develop into captivated with defending the Keys’ pure world and the way does that keenness affect your each day life and work?
JK: As a dive operator bringing folks out on their first snorkel or scuba diving expertise, I wished to guarantee that what they noticed impressed them to return again — and finally to be advocates for safeguarding the surroundings right here within the Keys and elsewhere. Becoming a member of REEF as a member, after which on workers, felt like a pure development to achieve extra guests and locals with alternatives to be taught and participate in actions that protect our marine ecosystems.
KT: How do you personally work to ‘join and defend’ the Keys’ surroundings and the island chain’s distinctive way of life?
JK: I put loads of emphasis on the ‘join’ half. REEF’s mission suits so nicely with the work of different conservation and training organizations, in addition to these concerned in tourism. On my final dive at Elbow Reef, I discovered the cutest juvenile high-hat, a tiny fish no greater than my thumbnail.
KT: What do you hope your environmental actions within the Keys will assist to perform?
JK: That my actions will fire up enthusiasm and encourage folks to be taught extra about how superb our surroundings is — after which to work collectively on sensible actions they will take to guard our shared surroundings.
