The School of Ocean Futures at Arizona State University

Become a part of ASU’s newest school dedicated to the planet’s largest biome.

With every drop of water you drink, every breath you take, you’re connected to the sea. No matter where on Earth you live.

Sylvia Earle marine biologist and first female chief scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

The College of Global Futures proudly announces the launch of its fourth school, which advances learning, discovery and partnerships that shape a thriving global future – the School of Ocean Futures.

Oceans are not just the world’s largest ecosystem, they are also one of the leading indicators of our planetary health and wellness. From the condition of coastal ecosystems to the robustness of marine populations, from fluctuations of sea temperatures that drive weather systems and sea levels to the sustenance of human populations that live along and depend on the seas, oceans have long been the keepers of mystery and solutions. But humanity has always intuitively known that as go the oceans, so goes societal health.

The School of Ocean Futures will provide the planet its newest academic home for studying and teaching about the current and future states of the ocean, and it will address the challenges our oceans experience due to increasing pressure from human activities. It combines research and teaching facilities in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans with the cutting-edge research facilities within the Rob and Melani Walton Center for Planetary Health on ASU’s Tempe campus. These will provide students with a wide array of experiential learning opportunities that will prepare them to conduct work of significant impact.

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Locations and facilities

Arizona

The School of Ocean Futures is based within ASU’s newest research and learning center, the Rob and Melani Walton Center for Planetary Health, home of the College of Global Futures. The Walton Center holds more than 70,000 square feet of laboratory space and countless collaborative environments to encourage transdisciplinary learning and exploration. Its landscape includes a functioning canal spur that dates to the Akimel O’Odham and the Piipaash people who cultivated this land more than 2,000 years ago.

Bermuda

Headquartered at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences, ASU’s Atlantic research and learning presence is rooted at an institution with more than 120 years of excellence in ocean science and research. Commonly known as BIOS, this facility houses a comprehensive campus of classrooms, laboratories, dormitories and vessels that allow scientists and scholars to venture into the surrounding Sargasso Sea, one of the world’s most diverse open-ocean ecosystems including the world’s most northern coral reefs. BIOS is home to the longest-running time-series on seawater chemistry, biology and physics (the Bermuda Atlantic Time-series Study), as well as the longest record of ocean sediment-trap studies in the world, the Oceanic Flux Program.

Hawaiʻi

With facilities on the Big Island that are administered by the U.S. Forest Service, the Hilo location is home to ASU’s Center for Global Discovery and Conservation Science and houses computational and chemical labs, offices, conference rooms and field operations space. Hawaiʻi is also home to the ASU Coral Atlas Laboratory, a network of field sites and land-based partners linking research and outreach to map the world’s coral reefs, and the Pacific RISA program (Honolulu) that supports Pacific island and coastal communities in adapting to the impacts of climate change.

Leadership

Susanne Neuer, the founding director of the school is a leading biological oceanographer and marine ecologist who has carried out much of her research in the subtropical Atlantic Ocean. As a teacher of oceanography, ecology, environmental life sciences and marine biology, she leads a research group that studies the role of ocean life in the carbon cycle and sequestration of atmospheric carbon dioxide, also called the biological carbon pump. Neuer’s work, which has examined sea ice organisms in the Arctic, the role of microorganisms in colonizing microplastic pollution in the ocean, and harmful algal blooms in local reservoirs, has received funding by the National Science Foundation and NASA.

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Ask us about ocean systems at ASU and how we are exploring their direct link to shaping our global future. Research programs are currently underway with courses and degree programs scheduled to commence in the fall of 2024.