Chantal Emilie Audran Will Serve as Acting Director
FOR RELEASE: 6/20/22
Tybee Island Marine Science Center announces that Chantal Emilie Audran will serve as Acting Director.
(Tybee Island, GA) – The Tybee Island Marine Science Center has announced that Chantal Emilie Audran will serve as its Acting Director, replacing Maria Procopio, formerly Executive Director, who will now focus her attention on exhibits. Audran previously served as the Center’s Curator.
According to Cathy Sakas, president of the Tybee Island Marine Science Foundation’s Board of Trustees, “Maria worked diligently to help Tybee Island Marine Science Center realize its long-term goal of building a new larger facility. She ably oversaw building the new Center located at the north end and then moving animals, tanks, and some exhibits into it from its former smaller facility located near the Pavilion. She will help Chantal smoothly transition from her former role and duties into her new lead role with many more responsibilities.”
Audran joined the Marine Science Center’s staff in 2011 as a senior marine science educator, teaching students and island visitors about the pristine beauty of coastal Georgia’s dynamic barrier islands. In addition,she wrote and implemented curriculum for Sidewalk to the Sea, the Center’ssignature education program that brings inner city students to the beach who otherwise would have no means to see their great Atlantic Ocean. She has presented the program modules at the National Science Teachers Association and Georgia Association of Marine Educators conferences. In 2014 she was promoted to curator and for the past eight years has designed and maintained the life support systems for the Marine Science Center’s live animal exhibits. During this time, Audran developed the protocol for the Marine Science Center’s Collection Program that has defined its practices as a catch-and-release facility (staff and volunteers collecting animals, locally). She also managed the facility’s Conservation Programs – diamondback terrapin and sea/shorebird rescue and actively volunteered in the Sea Turtle Stranding Network and Marine Mammal Stranding Network (Georgia Department of Natural Resources).
Audran’s love for marine science began at the Marine Biological Laboratories (MBL) in Woods Hole, MA., where she taught sea camp to children in the Periwinkle and Satellite Clubs. Upon completing her education in Biology and Chemistry at Loyola University Chicago and Georgia Southern University, she continued her path in marine education at the University of Georgia, Marine Extension in Savannah, GA, as a summer camp educator before joining the Tybee Island Marine Science Center.
About the Tybee Island Marine Science Center: Our mission is to cultivate a responsible stewardship of coastal Georgia’s natural resources through education, conservation, and research. For more information, please go to tybeemarinescience.org.