So Much Data, So Little Time

Since 1995, the Reserves’ System Wide Monitoring Program (SWMP) has tracked coastal weather and water quality, gathering more than 48 million data points annually from 300 monitoring stations across the United States. This data is crucial for local communities and industries, helping them track hazardous spills, monitor shellfish harvests, assess storm damage, and more. 

But with such an overwhelming amount of data comes an equally big challenge—finding time to analyze it all. That’s why Wisconsin’s Lake Superior Reserve teamed up with seven Reserves across the System to turn this challenge into an opportunity for both scientists-in-training and coastal communities.

“We saw an opportunity to give students at the University of Wisconsin hands-on experience analyzing complex data sets in ways that would address real-world management questions,” says Kait Reinl, research coordinator at the Reserve.

The course began with some matchmaking between students and the participating Reserves, each of which submitted a short video to introduce their estuary and specific management questions posed by local communities. Students used their own interests to rank the Reserves, ensuring they would work on a topic that excited them, leading to more engaged and meaningful work.

“This course was a real eye-opener to the possibilities of a targeted use for large environmental datasets,” says Ian Hart, a participating graduate student. “As someone in their last semester and looking for career options outside of academia, getting experience with user-driven data science was essential. Beyond the analytical techniques, I learned how to conduct research with user needs as the keystone.

Once matched with a Reserve, students collaborated with the staff to create a project plan that included timelines, expectations, and communication strategies. Regular check-ins with Reserve teams to collaboratively interpret the data provided valuable context and ensured the students’ analyses were relevant and useful to community management efforts.

The students focused on questions familiar to many coastal communities around the United States. For example, one student assessed how an upgraded wastewater treatment plant affected water quality in Chesapeake Bay, another compared water quality in urbanized versus pristine estuaries, and another studied the effects of heatwaves on eelgrass populations, providing valuable information for ongoing restoration efforts.

“This project helped us address a long running question our Reserve had regarding our SWMP data and determine some of the positive impacts that wastewater treatment plant upgrades have had in the watershed,” says Kyle Derby, research coordinator for the Chesapeake Bay Reserve in Maryland.

The course included a field trip to the Lake Superior Reserve in Wisconsin to give students the opportunity to understand the different sectors of a Reserve and do some hands-on learning about coastal systems. Students collected water quality data in an estuary, explored “data mysteries” with Reserve educators, practiced science communication with coastal trainers, and learned from applied science and restoration projects. They also spent time with members of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe, learning about the significance of the area to the tribe’s creation story and working in partnership with tribes to understand and manage coastal natural resources.

“This trip gave me the mental space and tools to think more deeply about place-based science through our comparison of different sites, learning about the disturbance history of the area, and hearing from the people of Fond du Lac,” says Danny Sydlowski, a participating graduate student. “It re-inspired my eye for place in a way that could not have happened in a classroom, and helped me re-connect to the waters we spend so much of our time thinking about.”

What began as a response to overwhelming data has now become a sustainable model for collaboration. Reinl and her colleagues are working on a proposal to fund two more rounds of data synthesis using this innovative teaching approach across the Reserve System over the next four years. 

“As coastal communities face the growing impacts of rising seas, flooding, declining water quality, and habitat loss, this project offers a blueprint for how we can turn Reserve data into a powerful tool for education and coastal management strategies that support the blue economy,” says Rebecca Roth, executive director of the National Estuarine Research Reserve Association. “By empowering students to work with Reserves and communities, the program ensures that coastal management is both data-driven and community-informed—key to building resilience on the coast.”