By Ryan Marshall

Peaks Island is a favorite spot of many a long-time Mainer. It’s instantly recognizable for its warm mystique, and home to a slew of unspoken secrets and delectable sights, as well as a cultivated cast of characters. Chief among the latter group, as it turns out, are the island’s elementary-school students.

Emma Christman, a student at downtown Portland’s very own Baxter Academy for Technology and Science, has been working rather closely with the local youth since the beginning of the fall. For the past six weeks, the kids have learned how to effectively grow and maintain kelp — surely an odd prospect to an outsider, but a most valuable opportunity for those with ambitions not unlike those of their mentor.

Kelp4Kids is intended to provide those involved with a more comprehensive understanding of aquaculture and related areas at an early age; the crop in question grows throughout the winter and well into the spring, culminating in the summertime, at which point it can be used for many purposes.

Christman, who is well into her senior year of high school, believes that the inspiration for the project came from the simple fact that there had not been any previously established program of this kind in the greater Portland area. Together with island district director Yvonne Thomas, she hopes to provide students with a unique educational experience which they will be able to carry with them into future endeavours of this nature.

Perhaps even more importantly, the exercises inherent in the program can teach the children a thing or two about the plant’s various uses outside of the kitchen. Kelp is among a handful of aquatic vegetation species that have the potential to reduce CO2 levels in the ocean, thus curbing the acidification that threatens marine life in a big way. Its influence extends far beyond the dock, and though the results of the harvest at large remain to be seen, it can be inferred that Peaks Island youth are one considerable step closer to really making a difference.

Things may be a bit quiet on Christman’s front (at least until nature has taken its course) for some time going forward, but laying low might indeed be in the interest of achieving even bigger and better things, as she intends to continue studying marine biology at either Middlebury, Bates or Bowdoin College in the near future. She’s certainly done her part to inspire a distinctive batch of intelligent, frequently curious individuals. Consider it another feather in her cap; some people can truly never have too many.