Scholarships available for students who feel a pull towards halibut

High school students who feel a special pull for halibut might merit a scholarship to a university or technical college.

Every two years the International Pacific Halibut Commission funds several $4,000 scholarships to U.S. and Canadian students connected to the Pacific halibut fishery. Since 1923 the Halibut Commission and its supporting scientists have been stewards of the Pacific stock from British Columbia to the Bering Sea.

David Wilson is IPHC director –

“If I was to highlight some of the recent candidates who’ve been successful in receiving the scholarship, it’s really been those who are dependents of active fishers within the Pacific halibut fleets, primarily the directed Pacific halibut flee, but it’s not solely restricted to dependence on those fisheries. We will certainly consider others if they were involved in charter or recreational fishing. So we could look at candidates from a broad spectrum of backgrounds, I guess, and somebody who expresses the desire or is more likely to come back to the industry postgraduate.”

The scholarships are renewable annually for the normal four-year period of undergraduate education. The IPHC also offers other teaching tools for all school ages.

“And one of the components of community outreach and education that we try and do is to reach a much broader range of stakeholders. And that includes doing outreach activities at various community events and also schools.”

An Ocean Literacy Program package is downloadable, including lesson plans.

And the colorful Flat or Fiction booklet is a keeper for any halibut lover. For example, did you know that the treaty that formed the Halibut Commission was the ﬁrst international treaty in the world for the protection of a marine resource?