Life is Their Oyster

Aquaculture Students Get Hands-On Experience on the Coast

Will Graves

Aquaculture is king in Mississippi. From farm-raised Delta catfish to oysters and blue crabs from the Gulf of Mexico, the state consistently leads the nation in aquaculture production. With the global demand for seafood and aquacultural products, there is also a need to recruit, educate and train the next generation of Mississippi’s aquaculture industry workforce.

Two schools on the coast have made waves by building innovative aquaculture programs that connect students with government and industry’s experiential learning opportunities and prepare them to tackle real-world problems in environmental conservation and commercial fish and vegetable production.

In 2016, Ocean Springs High School (OSHS) and Moss Point High School (MPHS) began developing cutting-edge high school-level programs to build student interest in aquaculture systems and research. At the time, only postsecondary aquaculture programs were available in Mississippi.

Bryan Butler, OSHS’s aquaculture teacher, was a leading figure in creating the approved aquaculture curriculum and became the first to implement a high school aquaculture program in the state. Butler’s program primarily focuses on fish production, but his students also get experience with oysters and blue crabs. The program structure helps them grow their knowledge, skills and leadership abilities over three years.

Students build everything they use in the greenhouses from scratch every year, from the fish tanks to water lines and filtration systems.

OSHS has four greenhouses, each containing seven tanks. Students work in different aquaculture production areas depending on their progression in the program. They also learn about sustainable food production by incorporating aquaponics — the production of hydroponic vegetables by recycling the nutrient-rich water from the greenhouse fish tanks.

“What I’m trying to do is prepare them for anything that they can do in a biology or a mechanical biology-based

field, or anything like that,” Butler said.

Students form teams and manage a fish tank from hatching to harvest. First-year students focus solely on freshwater fish such as striped bass and get introduced to aquaponics by growing tomatoes, watermelons, squash and other vegetables. Second-year students take on saltwater fish by raising speckled trout, oysters and blue crabs.

“When they leave here, they will have a solid biology background along with the aquaculture as well. If they want to go into the field, they can. A lot of my students have transitioned from the classroom to the workforce through the research lab. They’re opening up an oyster hatching facility in Gulfport that my kids are going to start applying for so they can go directly back into that field,” Butler said.

Students work with professional marine biologists and fisheries researchers from the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory (GCRL) in their third and final year in the program. They do everything they do for their school projects — analyzing water quality for food stock, fish production and release and more — but on a larger scale.

MPHS aquaculture teacher Ignacio Lopez-Morales’ program — Mississippi’s only other high school aquaculture program — also runs on the three-year progression model but has an innovative approach to oyster production: an oyster processing project focused on value addition by adding flavoring to the oyster during the growth process.

“We’re basically going to buy regular oysters that grow on the bottom of the sea and then do value addition to them,” Lopez-Morales said. “Broadly speaking, students take the oysters, clean and sort them by size and quality. We then Opposite page: The Ocean Springs High School (OSHS) aquaculture program students help University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast Research Lab researchers transport and release fish into a body of water by using a specialized portable tank system. Top: The OSHS aquaculture program emphasizes teamwork and accountability. At the beginning of the school year the class is divided into teams that are responsible for the daily management and data collection of their assigned fish tank. Bottom: The Moss Point High School (MPHS) aquaculture program set up a vendor booth at the 2020 Cruisin’ The Coast event in Moss Point. With help from teacher Ignacio Lopez-Morales, they cooked and sold seafood and other treats to raise money for the expansion of their aquaculture facilities.

MPHS aquaculture students hosted the Moss Point Rotary Club for its meeting in May 2022. Students toured Rotarians and school administrators through their aquaculture and aquaponics facilities and explained the innovative projects they undertake.

introduce them into purging systems where the oysters purge their insides. Then we add flavoring, whether that be just straight salt or some other flavor. We’re dabbling with two main flavors right now, cinnamon and garlic, both separately and together. We ultimately create a flavored oyster with consistent flavor and consistently clean insides.”

The MPHS aquaculture program’s oyster flavoring project was recently approved as a nonprofit enterprise, which means students get the science and engineering experience of designing, building and managing aquaculture systems and learn real-world business management skills by leading their own projects. At its core, the MPHS aquaculture program is designed to instill a sense of purpose and combine technical skills with the soft skills needed to succeed in college or a career.

Lopez-Morales has also connected his MPHS students with scientists at the GCRL. A former aquaculture systems engineer with extensive experience in the business side of the industry, Lopez-Morales strives to ignite a desire in his students to continue learning and growing their skillset. He credits them for how far they have come.

“It’s very nice and very rewarding, because everything that has happened in this this facility, and where we came from — which was absolutely nothing compared to where we are today — has all been because of my students,” Lopez-Morales said.

Both programs are making a splash in generating student interest and connecting them to aquaculture systems, coastal conservation management and sustainable food system production opportunities.

OSHS program completer Bayley Wilmoth says Butler teaches students to chase their curiosity about the world and builds the foundation to lead them to an aquaculture career.

“I chose to go to Mississippi State University (MSU) and study wildlife, fisheries and aquaculture to feed that curiosity because of the leadership and love shown by Bryan Butler’s passion for his job and the program he built,” Wilmoth said. “I would tell any student who is contemplating enrollment to try it. You might turn it into a career that you love.”