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Winnipegger on guard for oceans: Ocean Bridge’s Kirsten Desorcy profiled in Manitoba newspaper

Everyone needs to care about the ocean. Whether you live on the coast, or not. That is the message that Ocean Bridge’s Kirsten Desorcy is sharing. She’s an ocean ambassador with Ocean Bridge, even though she lives in the heart of the Prairies.

Kirsten – who lives in Steinbach, Manitoba – was one of 160 young professionals selected from across Canada to be part of this year’s Ocean Bridge program.

Ocean Bridge is a year-long conservation and leadership program for Canadian youth aged 18 to 30. Founded by Ocean Wise in 2018, participants deliver ocean service projects in their home communities and gather for two immersive expeditions. Ocean Bridge is accessible to youth from all geographies, education and income levels. Thanks to new funding from the Government of Canada, in 2020, Ocean Bridge was able to expand from 40 participants to 160.

Kristin was recently featured in an article in the Winnipeg Free Press about her participation in the Ocean Bridge program as well as her project to get Manitobans to pick up garbage while out for solo walks during COVID-19. Using the hash tag #covid19pickupthattrash, Kristin is inspiring her community to collect trash while out walking, take photographs of their trash bags, then post the photos to their social media accounts.

As describe in the article, Kristin then displays the “trashy family photos” on her personal blog — desorcylab.webstarts.com — where she has a digital trash bag counter keeping track of how the cleanup is going.

“Trash is one of the biggest problems right now with ocean health,” said Kristin. “Eighty per cent of all trash that makes it to the ocean comes from inland. All waterways, even the ditches and the sewers, lead to the ocean eventually.”

Congratulations Kristin! Keep up the good work!

Posted May 4, 2020 by Ocean Wise

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