Olive Andrews is a research scientist and is the Marine Programme Manager for Conservation International. When she is not “guiding marine research and tourism expeditions from the tropics to the poles”, Olive resides on Waiheke Island.

Olive came into school to speak to the Year 11 and Year 12 classes as a part of their Academic/Careers and Mentoring course. Students were captivated as she shared her experiences of leading scientific research up in the Pacific Islands, her conservation projects and career journey. Olive’s impersonation of  Mr Curly’s (humpback whale) mating song was a crowd favourite!

More recently Olive spoke to the Year 7 Social Studies classes about her experiences down in Antartica. They were fascinated by all the different categories of ice, the penguins stealing each others nesting rocks, the ability of the Antarctic winds to blow people vertically across the ice plains. Of course the students loved all her cute photos of seals and Lolita the Whale who has a love heart on her dorsal fin.  After Olives talk, it appears half of our Year 7’s are now considering pursuing Marine Biology and want Olive’s job!

We are lucky on Waiheke to have so many passionate experts in our community. Our students benefit from engaging with our wider community adding depth to our localised curriculum. Exposing students to real world experiences is so valuable and inspires them to see where their education can take them!

Kia Ora Olive.

Julie Campbell, Science Teacher

Click on this link to watch a video about Olive’s research in Niue

https://www.conservation.org/blog/meet-a-scientist-the-whale-whisperer

http://kermadec.aucklandmuseum.com/expedition-team/olive-andrews/