That makes these two juniors at MSD co-founders and best friends. The Coral Springs teens are natural soulmates for the enterprise, since they have been connected at the hip for years.

“We’ve been friends since the sixth grade,” Corniel said. “We formed our friendship because we were so alike. We instantly became best friends. We even have had a lot of similar classes in school. We have done everything together. We played soccer together in middle school and in high school. We’ve always been two peas in a pod.”

What brought them together at MSD was their common interest in DECA, a school-based program that looks for emerging leaders and entrepreneurs for careers in marketing, finance, hospitality and management in high schools and colleges around the globe.

“The DECA program at MSD started almost 20 years ago,” Corniel said. “Since the start, every quarter we have had a Professional Dress Day where all DECA students wear business outfits. We learn what’s appropriate, how to tie a tie and all that stuff.”

Because of their intense involvement in DECA, Corniel and Rogalla were given the opportunity to lead a chapter project.

“We were looking for ideas, and we wanted to do something to give back,” Rogalla said. “The type of initiative we’re running is a community giving project. When we were brainstorming some ideas, one thing that really came to us at one of our officer meetings for DECA.”

The friends and collaborators found out they would no longer be having Professional Business Dress Days at their school. Those are days in which DECA students would have to dress up in professional business attire to school and then would be graded for it.

“The professional dress days are where students learn that they need to tuck in their shirts and make their skirts longer so they go past their knees, and things like that,” Rogalla said. “The guidelines are meant to help students learn how to make a big impression when they’re doing job interviews for business. The reason the advisors told us that they wouldn’t be having the business dress occasions anymore was because they told us that a lot of the students couldn’t afford to buy the clothing, since it was basically only going to be worn one time for these special days.”

Thet learned that even in an affluent community like theirs, there were students who just didn’t have enough resources to afford perks like special clothes for occasions like these.

“We were really shocked by the idea that we wouldn’t be having these special days anymore,” Corniel said. “We did some research and found out that in Parkland, the average household income is around $200,000. But in Broward County as a whole, it’s only $61,000. So we realized how much harder it must be in lower income areas if some of the kids in our immediate area were having a tough time. So that’s what inspired the idea for Career Closet.”

They said they wanted to help other students because they realize how important presentation is in getting a job and advancing a career.

“We know it’s super important to have the right clothes, because we learned in our classes how important first impressions are with interviews, based on how you present yourself,” Corniel said. “So without that, young people are at a disadvantage. That’s why my friend and I started our initiative.”

She said they learned that, statistically, the first 10 seconds of a meeting for a job can often determine whether they reject or accept an applicant.

“We learned everything, like even how wearing the color blue increases your chances for acceptance,” Corniel said. “We know how important having professional dress is for everyone. We also learned that if you don’t come to an interview with a tie, it can decrease your chances of getting a job. And we think everyone should have an equal opportunity.”

What they do

Corniel and Rogalla started Career Closet in October. Their main goal is to regularly collect business attire for students, including blazers, skirts, blouses, jewelry, cologne and anything else that is relevant for interviews. The friends are working with businesses, the community and other schools to make this happen. Once they collect the clothing, they hold small events where they get volunteers to help, then they donate the clothes to other organizations.

“We have a lot of different ways of collecting clothes,” Corniel said. “One way is by contacting local businesses to work with us. We call up local businesses and ask them if they are willing to have a bin at their address so that people can come and donate. Another way is if people want to donate directly to us, then they can drop it off at MSD. We’ve also posted signs all over our community.”

Rogalla said that they are trying to focus on finding locations where it’s easy to drop off clothing.

“We’ve done collections at the Parkland Library. We’ve also done collections at popular local businesses in Coral Springs,” she said, “We’ve done collections at MSD as well. We also know people on a personal level who have donated clothing items.”

Getting the word out

As students interested in business, Corniel and Rogalla said they know how important it is to market their message to get others on board with their mission.

“We advertise to groups to ask them for business professional and business casual clothes,” Rogalla said. “We designate days at our school where we sort through all the professional pants, all the professional shirts and so on. We also sort out anything that does not meet those requirements and put them in another pile. Then we bring a lot of those items to different organizations that aren’t specifically looking for professional clothing.”

Corniel said that, as far as getting the word out to local businesses, they mostly either walk to them in person and talk with them, or they call them and use social media to connect. Rogalla said they have been fortunate to be able to connect with the chamber to get the word out about their mission.

“As far as advertising for our clothing collection efforts, Arizel and I were given the opportunity to speak and network at the Coral Springs Chamber of Commerce,” Rogalla said. “We spoke in front of the Women’s Alliance there. We also had a networking event at our school with the Parkland Chamber of Commerce, where we spoke and told them and the community about Career Closet.”

To make things more efficient, the duo has also been able to send mass emails to the staff of MSD to ask them to donate. Now they are working on trying the same technique at other Broward schools to get their participation.

“We’re also contacting corporate centers on the weekends by phone and asking them if they want to get involved,” Rogalla said. “We go door-to-door to businesses, or we email or call them to see if they want to be a part of it.”

Headed into the future

Corniel said they have received positive feedback from students, teachers and business professionals.

“At networking events, we have had business women eagerly giving us their business cards,” she said. “We’ve never heard anything negative. Even if a business declines to be part of it, they always tell us that they think this is such a great project.”

Even though the initiative is only a few months old, they are making plans for Career Closet to survive past their own oversight of the effort.

“Next year, we definitely want to make this an established club at MSD, so the school can continue doing this work to give back even after we graduate,” Rogalla said.

Career Closet also works with nonprofits outside of their own school environment, including Women in Distress, Broward Outreach Center and Dress for Success.

To make a donation to Career Closet, bring professional-style clothing to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, 5901 Pine Island Road, Parkland.

Follow @MSDCareerCloset on Instagram.

The Rev. Leslie Hague, also known as Mother Leslie, and Richard Markiewicz, the church’s senior warden, created a new ministry called Laundry Love South Florida in 2019. They were inspired by the national organization that was created 20 years ago to help people in need get their clothes and linens washed for free.

All Saints Episcopal now has events once a month at The Laundry Spot at 1410 N. Federal Highway in Hollywood. The laundromat has become the main venue for the church’s outreach. During the first two months of 2022, volunteers helped over 50 individuals and families wash and dry over 1.5 tons of bedding and clothing.

Based on recent national statistics gathered by Laundry Love, people who don’t have laundry appliances can spend around $100 per month on washing clothing and bedding. Another caution is that dirty clothing and bedding can have adverse effects on children in school. Unclean clothes as well as lead to health and mental wellness issues in adults.

According to the organization, they have helped people with over 2 million loads of laundry and served over 1.5 million people since 2003. They also have worked with an estimated 100,000 people every year through their efforts.

Formed from a partnership

Laundry Love not only helps the homeless, but it also helps people of limited income, including the working poor.

Markiewicz initiated the idea for the church to get involved with the effort. It all started with a working relationship that had already been going on with a Broward shelter.

“We had been giving money to the Jubilee Center for the Homeless in Hollywood for years to assist their efforts,” Markiewicz said. “In 2019, I happened to ask the leader of the center if there was anything they were missing from their services for the homeless. She quickly told us she was trying to figure out how to do laundry for her clients.”

The accounts of how the center’s clients were dealing with their situation kept him up that night as he thought about what the church could do to help.

“It bothered me so much to hear the stories of what homeless people were doing to get their laundry done,” he said. “They were going to a swimming pool to get their clothes clean, or they were simply not even bothering to clean them at all.”

Markiewicz’s reflections brought back a memory of an Episcopal priest from Massachusetts who had started a laundry program several years before.

“I called her up and she told me that there is a national program called Laundry Love,” he said. “So I decided to travel to Massachusetts for a vacation. While I was there, I went to see the program in action. I was just blown away by what they had been doing.”

After Markiewicz’s visit to the organization’s efforts up north, he took notes and brought his experience back to Fort Lauderdale to share with his church.

“When I came back, I talked with Rev. Hague and she was very supportive of the idea,” he said. “I told her I would figure it out, including funding, the laundry facility and so on. People at the church were also very supportive. There were a lot of practical questions about how to fund it and so on, but everybody was happy at the end, which was great. The church then granted a small amount of seed money and we went forward from there.”

Markiewicz said within a couple of days after he announced it to the parish, the money started flowing in from the congregation and they embraced the project. He also said he realized that, to make this effort successful, he would have to bring in a partner.

“We started working with the Jubilee Center in Hollywood,” he said. “They have their own clients and community. We talked with people there. We also had large posters made and we started out by handing out flyers there.”

The national movement

Hague said the national Laundry Love organization started in Ventura, California.

“It was really a man known as ‘T-Bone’, a houseless person, who was asked by a church how they could walk this life journey with him,” she said. “He said quite simply that he felt like if he had clean clothes, that people would treat him more like a human being.”

She said the church in California ended up developing their own ministry to address the need. They decided to partner, along with secular organizations, with a laundromat to make it happen. She said that is what All Saints decided to do here in Broward.

“Rather than getting expensive appliances for a homeless shelter like the Jubilee Center, we went out and found a laundromat who would collaborate with us in our effort,” she said. “In this case, we have been incredibly blessed to partner with the Laundry Spot in Hollywood.”

The monthly event

Hague said that once a month, they have volunteers at the laundromat along with supplies and money for the loads.

“We don’t do the laundry for the clients,” she said. “They have to do that themselves. But volunteers help them choose what size machines they need, then we handle the payments. A part of the empowerment is that they get to do their own laundry. We will help with seniors or people who are impaired, but generally they do their own loads.”

Hague said the church and volunteers don’t have questionnaires or prerequisites for those who come to the monthly event.

“For three hours once a month, people walk in the door,” she said. “We don’t ask them anything other than their first name. We don’t ask if they are working, or whether they have a home. It’s not just the homeless who are often treated badly because they smell… Often, it’s the working poor who have uniforms, or their kids need clean clothes for school and they’re trying to budget laundry in with everything else.”

Grant Einhorn owns The Laundry Spot in Hollywood.

“The Laundry Spot Hollywood is proud to support the Laundry Love initiative. Our customers are working class and many struggle to make ends meet. With rising costs everywhere, we understand that it might be hard to stay afloat, but it’s terrible to think families have to worry about whether or not they can afford to have clean clothes for work and school,” he said. “We want to help alleviate that burden for local families and do our part to make the community a better place.”

Hague’s wife, Katie Casteel, has been volunteering with Laundry Love since it was started three years ago.

“There was a time in my own life when I was younger and my parents either didn’t have a washer and dryer in our house, or sometimes something broke and then you couldn’t get it fixed, because it’s expensive to do laundry,” she said. “Since everybody needs clean clothes, it’s a great way to give back to the community.”

Residents Neil Bruteig and Vivan Toro are beneficiaries of the Laundry Love program.

“I live in this area. This has been a godsend, with what they’ve done for the last three years. It’s very helpful having this once a month,” Bruteig said. “It’s helped me so much, especially after I lost my job during the pandemic. Thank God for them. I appreciate what they’re doing for others. I’ve gotten to know these people very well.”

Toro is “grateful for these guys coming in here, because like they say, a clean home is a happy home. When you’ve got clean clothes, that’s a happy body and person. Nobody else in Hollywood really does something like this. It’s just a great program that everybody needs.”

Help from Laundry Love is available from 4 to 7 p.m. on the second Tuesday of each month at The Laundry Spot, 1410 N. Federal Highway, in Hollywood.

Visit allsaintsfl.org/laundry-of-love and laundrylove.org/donate.

Both John Knox residents and others in the community filled the large event room to hear speakers talk about changing the narrative on aging.

They included: Ben Nemtin, creator of “The Buried Life Series” on MTV; Chris Brickler, CEO of MyndVR on Virtual Reality, Aging & Health; Michael Roizen, creator of The Great Age Reboot; Jean Accius, AARP Global Thought Leader; and D.C.-based Gail Kohn on Age Friendly Cities.

Maria Shriver, the keynote speaker, made a presentation with a virtual conversation broadcast from her home in Montecito, California. While the huge screen with her image filled the stage, so did her message about how people need to reframe their past thinking about their advancing years.

Other than being known as the first lady of California while married to former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, she has been a broadcast journalist, news anchor, author and, more recently, a leading advocate on aging well. Shriver has also created her own summit called “Radically Reframing Aging,” which is a Master Class on “Age, Health, Purpose and Joy.”

First-person view of aging

Shriver was always known for her mission-driven life, whether it was based on her journalism, documentary work or her more behind-the-scenes work while her husband was leading California.

A mother and grandmother, much of her perspective on aging is reflected through her current work, both through her research, presentations and her maturing family life.

“One of the missions of ‘Aging Greatly’ is to change the narrative around aging,” Shriver told the crowd at John Knox Village. “I think narratives are critical to all of us. We all have a narrative that we tell ourselves, and we have to update that narrative as we move forward in our life. Our narrative needs to help us to move forward. I’m constantly looking at my life and asking, ‘Where am I going?’ What am I doing? Am I of service? How am I creating meaningful relationships?’ That kind of looking at our life holistically is a big part of our health.”

One of the big factors behind the rethinking about aging is the fact that people are more focused on health and longevity than they ever have been before.

“Because of science and what we know about healthier lifestyles, people are now living longer than ever before,” she said. “Ten thousand people are turning 65 years old every single day. Many of them are still working. Many of them are even starting new careers. Many of them are becoming entrepreneurs.”

Shriver pointed out that the often-criticized generation that she grew up in has been leading the charge in this new way of thinking.

“Boomers have been inventive and innovative in creating new ways of looking at aging,” she said.” In every way, our society is pushing this conversation forward to say that we are still relevant. Our voices matter. We still have money to put into the economy. We still want to start businesses. We want to stay in our jobs. We’re here. And I think that’s a very important and positive development when we talk about aging.”

Shriver said she looks at the bigger picture for her own life, which has helped her to rethink outdated precepts about getting older.

“As seniors, we should be asking, ‘Who am I today? What is my mission today? Are there things that I want to take off my plate? Are there new areas or avenues that I want to pursue? And if so, how do I go about pursuing that?'”

Bucking the tradition of her own parents’ generation, Shriver said that she has become an entrepreneur in her 60s.

“At age 65, I started a food company for brain health with my son Patrick, called Mosh,” she said. “This is a whole new world for me. There are a lot of other women and men I meet who tell me that they are realizing a new dream in their 60s. They may have been a lawyer, a doctor, a teacher or a mom, but now they’re doing something completely different.”

Part of getting past the old ways of looking at being old is to look at the upside of what the more advanced years can bring.

“I think that we don’t celebrate aging enough,” Shriver said. “I think we’re looking at a sea change when it comes to aging. We’re understanding it better. We’re realizing that it’s a political issue. It’s a professional issue. It’s a personal issue. It’s a public service.”

Helping seniors to take charge

Shriver said her best advice to seniors and younger people looking forward is that they should make being healthy in many ways their top priority.

“I think first of all, your health is critical,” she said. “It’s easy for me, of course, to sit here and talk about aging, because I have my health. But the sooner we begin to prioritize our health, be it in our 20s, 30s, 40s or 50s, or just today, that makes all the difference. It makes aging more exciting and full of possibilities.”

Dealing with chronic disease is imperative, she said, but making the most of what you can control is the best anyone can do.

Future focus is important as a way of thinking when it comes to again, according to Shriver.

“I think having a mindset that helps you look forward is really critical,” she said. “I have a mission and passion and purpose in my life. My volunteerism in the field of Alzheimer’s and women’s health research is really something that gets me up every day, because I can see the work that needs to be done. I can see the goalposts even though they’re far away.”

Shriver said that other factors for health and happiness that are important for aging well include deep relationships, finding purpose through volunteering and a belief in a higher power. A willingness to question old ideas and old views of yourself are critical as well.

Blending age groups in companies and workplaces is another aspect of refreshing one’s attitudes toward getting older.

“I know that companies can do a better job of mixing generations,” Shriver said. “In my company Mosh, there are people in their 60s and people in their 20s. We all have something to teach one another so we can do better. We can do better in our families by revering and listening respectfully to our elders.”

Getting the message out

Monica Morrissey McAfee is the chief marketing and innovation officer for John Knox Village who was the main interviewer for Shriver and part of the team that organized the presentation.

“The symposium was a natural evolution of everything that’s been happening at JKV,” she said. “We’ve talked about ‘Where Possibility Plays’ at the village and we’ve been trying very intentionally to bring that to life.”

McAfee is one of the people who works on ideas about where the community is headed for the future of their residents.

“We feel very committed to the concept of being thoughtful stewards,” she said. “We’re always trying to be ahead of the game. So we wanted to figure out who the thought leaders are today in this space. We don’t presume to know everything.”

McAfee said she has great admiration for Shriver, which made her enthusiastic about the opportunity to interview her for the symposium.

“I loved what Maria Shriver emphasized about always asking questions, staying connected and reaching out to different people in different areas to ascertain what the best way was to move forward,” she said. “When I saw Maria do a presentation on Radically Reframing Aging, I realized that this is exactly what we want to achieve.”

Mark Dobosz is executive director of the John Knox Village Foundation and one of the event’s organizers.

“What we wanted to do was to rely upon our strengths and thought leadership around aging services,” he said. “So we looked at who were some of our existing partners like the Great Age Reboot and the MIT Aging Lab, and we began looking at who we could bring together that would help not only elders within the community but also the practitioners outside of the community and bring them together all in the same room.”

He said the idea was to bring together a broad range of thinking, both in terms of academics and in terms of advocacy for attendees.

“What we were thinking about was having a good cross section of people, so that we were able to address everybody’s interests concerning aging and be able to attract as many people as possible.”

Becker said the symposium presented relevant information to which she could relate.

“The information was so good, because it was more than just what the usual doctors talk about,” she said. “They talked about our everyday lives more than anything else. They really helped me to realize that the best is yet to come.”

John Knox Village resident Tom McDowell called what he learned “some really exciting stuff.”

“The people brought here today are very accomplished and there are a lot of things that I think we’ll be putting to use here at the village,” he said. “I’m 83 years old, and I’m looking forward to the next 25.”

The initiative came about from an idea that was generated from Operation Establish Trust, a community group that gets together regularly to discuss what can be done to establish better relations between the Broward Sheriff’s Office and the community. The group consists of police officers, teachers and residents and was co-founded by Nagy, along with Col. Gregory Johnson of the JROTC program at Pompano High.

Last year, the group had a similar competition a food drive competition for Broward Partnership. This year, Nagy said they wanted to expand their offerings to clothes and toys for kids at Christmas who may be homeless or part of a family struggling to make ends meet.

This year, the participants in the group decided that they didn’t need to look any further than the elementary school next door. Nagy said he asked Principal Shezette Small to have her teachers and counselors identify students in need.

Leader of the pack

Nagy is the leader in the team effort to bring happiness to youth in need in Pompano.

“The whole event took a month of planning with the Broward Sheriff’s Office,” he said. “I meet with them on a weekly basis and we discuss what we can do to establish better relations between the BSO and the local community. The clothing and toy drive came up as one of those ideas.”

The idea of making the event a friendly competition between the students and police was to encourage positive interaction between kids and law enforcement, Nagy said.

“It shows the students that there’s a lot more to the BSO than just enforcing the law. And we make it a fun contest,” he said.

Nagy said it wasn’t hard to identify children in need.

“We thought we would see how many of those kids were in need, whether they were homeless, or below the poverty line,” he said. “I got a list of 77 kids from their principal, and we ended up giving two toys to each of those kids.”

During the event, the officers approached the school in the morning in a long line of vehicles as a show of their unified force to help those in need. As the cars approached the school, the students who were going to receive the gifts began cheering with excitement.

Once the officers arrived at the scene, they got out of their vehicles led by Santa. Along with the officers, he got huge shouts of happiness from the crowd. The officers then worked with the high school student volunteers in handing out the clothes and gifts to the students. The officers were clearly moved by the excitement of the little ones who got their gifts.

“The BSO really enjoyed the event,” Nagy said, smiling. “They love being around the kids, and they empathize with the whole purpose behind it as well.”

Deputy Aaron Moore, an officer with the Broward Sheriff’s Office Neighborhood Support Team, was all on board with the effort.

“It was a great event that focused entirely on working with and helping the youth in our community,” he said. “We know that during the holidays there are lots of people are impacted and affected in many ways. The BSO truly enjoyed being a vessel of service making this holiday season memorable for so many who can’t on their own.”

The students who got involved with the drive did it out of a passion to make a difference, since Nagy doesn’t offer any school incentives to get involved.

“It matters to me that our students understand what it’s like to be involved in helping the community,” he said. “I don’t give them extra credit or extra service hours. I simply offer them the chance to help somebody, and that’s the whole thing. Because in the long run, the students learn about the cause and about giving, rather than just getting a pat on the back.”

Student profile: Ally Vagelos

Ally Vagelos is a senior at Pompano High School. She also serves as president of the Make Our Schools Safe student organization.

“Mr. Nagy brought me the idea of the clothing and toy drive that he did last year,” she said. “He asked us if we wanted to get involved this year in a similar effort. It was really engaging, because we ended up working with different organizations to help make this happen.”

Vagelos said that she was amazed at the event.

“I’ve been here for four years, and this was definitely the most heartwarming event I’ve ever seen at Pompano High School,” she said. “It was amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it. Seeing all the children really helped to put a face on who you’re giving a gift to. It felt different than just giving to an organization. And it’s nice to know how many children were actually touched with this effort.”

Student profile: Cali Berrios

Cali Berrios is a freshman at Pompano Beach High School. She’s new to the volunteering scene there.

“As a freshman, this is the first time I’ve invested my time into something so big and so heartwarming. It was a great first experience at the school.

“As student volunteers, we’re just so amazed at how this turned out,” she said. “These cute little kids happen to be underprivileged and it was so great seeing them receive the gifts. It’s as amazing for us to experience giving these gifts, as I’m sure it is for them to receive them.”

Student profile: Meera Ghanem

Meera Ghanem is a freshman at Pompano High School. She is in the Student Government Association. Ghanem got involved in the project as soon as she heard about it. She said she gets involved with many events in and out of school.

“We’ve been working on this project for a couple of months,” she said. “With the clothing and toy drive, we wanted to make some kids happier for the holidays, since the don’t have all the opportunities that we have. We got the whole school to donate as many clothes and toys as they could to bring a smile to another child’s face.”

Saint Mark’s Episcopal School recently announced the opening of SeaLab, a STEM experiential learning facility focusing on solutions to sea level rise, water quality, marine habitats, hydroelectricity and identification of microplastics, forever chemicals (PFAS) and other pollutants.

SeaLab is a testing facility that has been built on the school grounds as an engineered tidal pool built next to the Middle River, which flows into the containment area.. The new environmental science lab gives students the opportunity to learn and test scientific solutions to water and sustainability issues in Florida and beyond.

Working with Nova Southeastern University, the school is engaging its students in learning modules and is also conducting experiments in STEM learning.

The Middle River waterway is a key habitat for marine growth, manatees and young fish stock. It also was a busy oyster bed at one time. By researching the waterway, the students can study how it has become contaminated from runoff, plastics and general pollution.

One of the goals is to explore options for restoring oyster beds, to study levels of microplastics and other contaminants. The most important reason, according to the school, is to train the next generation of science educators through their partnership with NSU.

George Hanbury, NSU president, CEO

Hanbury, a big supporter of the SeaLab project, was a key speaker at the launch of SeaLab.

“NSU is the only doctoral research university located in Broward and headquartered here, so we want to be a part of this school project,” he said. “I commend the headmaster for his vision for seeing how kids can be involved in biological science even in grade school.”

Hanbury gave kudos to the vision of demonstrating to students what’s going on in the marine ecosystem, rather than just talking with them about it.

“This school is being smart in showing these students the importance of a canal, and how that body of water feeds through to the ocean,” he said. “They’re also showing how the ocean supports the coral reefs, which support sea life, the wetlands and the whole cycle of life.”

Hanbury said he thinks that the SeaLab project is a good example of what can be replicated at other schools in the area.

“I think we would all be better off if this model was replicated at other schools, because you have to start at a young age and understand how everything ties together,” he said. “There are simple things that kids learn, such as why they shouldn’t bring balloons around a waterway that kills turtles and fills their stomachs so that they end up starving to death. More importantly, they learn why it’s important to save the wetlands and not dig it up for development.

Spencer Taintor, head of school

Taintor said he is excited about the potential for the future of the SeaLab at his school, as well as its potential for inspiring other schools to follow their lead.

“I absolutely hope that this becomes a model for experiential learning,” he said. “I don’t expect most schools to have access to water like we do in South Florida, however. We’re privileged as a school to have that. The SeaLab is an experiential learning environment that can empower our students to be able to challenge community problems. Now we’re developing kids who can have an impact in the future.

Taintor said he loves the idea of getting the students directly involved in the science of environmental issues and dilemmas.

“That’s what we want,” he said. “Sooner or later, one of those kids is going to come up with an idea for a solution that no one has thought of. I hope that other schools will look at this for their own students. I want us to be a model for other schools anywhere in terms of helping local sustainability issues, whether it’s about water quality or dealing with ‘forever chemicals’ in rivers and streams. Schools can be solution providers. They just have to take action.”

Alec Bogdanoff, co-founder of Brizaga Inc.

Bogdanoff is the principal and co-founder of Brizaga, the engineering consulting company that worked with St. Mark’s to create SeaLab.

“We were approached by Dr. Taintor and he said he had this vision to create a Living Lab at the waterfront,” Bogdanoff said. “Our role in this was really to be the innovation creator and to figure out how we can take his concept and actually implement it.”

From design to permitting, Bogdanoff said that he communicated with the Department of Environmental Protection, helped the school select a contractor and worked with them through the entire process of building the project.

He said he is excited to see what the students learn from the lab studies. He also said that he hopes the youth see the bigger picture of how important science is for solving problems.

“Going forward, we want people to think about our waterfront assets across South Florida, to figure out how we take that land and make it an opportunity for education,” he said. “The next generation will have to solve these environmental problems. And by sparking that joy for science, this school is creating a pathway for the youth to do just that.”

William Sebaly, student

Although he’s just dipping his toe into the waters with the project, the St. Mark’s seventh-grader is already beginning to absorb an interest for his own path.

“The SeaLab is sparking a bit of interest in me for marine biology,” Sebaly said. “Last year in sixth grade, we had to take a field trip to a marine lab to the Keys where we did a lot of very similar stuff using microscopes to study microorganisms. Now we can do it here.”

The proximity of the SeaLab is a bonus, since he said the water is personal for him.

“I’ve always grown up near the water, and it’s really great that I can interact with the water even at school,” Sebaly said. “It’s really exciting to just be able to step into the backyard of St. Mark’s and be able to touch, feel and experiment with the canal. We’re able to study all the microplastics and other microorganisms that are living there.”

Sebaly has a bigger perspective on the SeaLab, beyond how it can help him to study marine life and the environment.

“I feel like this lab at the school opens the door, or at least a path, for all the students here,” he said. “It’s certainly another experience that you can take with you for the rest of your life.”