There are few causes that I believe are more important than educating the public about our industry to dispel the negative image we have. Lately, there have been a number of laudable efforts to do just that. The ones I think have the best chance are efforts to teach school children about the industry. Their minds are still open as opposed to the over 25s who have most often developed hard stances taken from constant bombardment of misinformation. In fact, you have seen in this column a number of references to Total's museum and media campaign aimed at the school children of France, a program that has made great strides.
Another program (and I am sure there are many more) has reached a milestone of sorts. The Offshore Energy Center (OEC) has just released Project E3: Expanding Energy Education. Funded by the American Association of Drilling Engineers (AADE), the program is designed to introduce offshore energy modules into various curricula - science, social studies, math, geography - from grade school through high school. Each module is a self-contained lesson to be implemented by a school teacher. The program booklet contains 24 modules and includes all the basic instructions, and much of the material, needed to complete each lesson. Topics range from "Around the World With Offshore Money" (you would be surprised how many countries picture some aspect of offshore oil and gas on their currency) to "LNG IQ" to "Strong Shapes." In these three modules alone are geography of offshore regions, math, social studies, chemistry, geometry and mechanical engineering concepts, all centered on an offshore energy theme.
The program, fully certified by all necessary education oversight authorities, is available to teachers free of charge. And that includes instructions in the use of the program and its modules. If you know a teacher or school that might be interested in the program, please contact the Offshore Energy Center, 200 N. Dairy Ashford, Suite 6220, Houston, Texas or visit their Web site at www.oceanstaroec.com.
By the way, Project E3: Expanding Energy Education joins OEC's successful "Knowledge Box" program, which provides pre-packaged, hands-on instruction about the oil and gas industry using multimedia, physical models and other education material. That program is also supported by AADE.
It's holiday time here as I write and that usually means that thoughts turn to holidays past. Mine turned to one Christmas in particular - the Christmas of 1981. It was one of the coldest on record in the southern United States. It was not a good time to be on a drilling barge in the swamps below New Orleans, but I was. Why do I remember it? Let's see: I sent a barge out on a 8-hour trip and it returned 24 hours later with a bare metal hull at the water line scoured clean by the ice; I was not home for the house full of celebrating relatives; the toilets on the rig froze Christmas day; the regular cook changed out and the new cook showed up dead drunk, or on drugs, or both; he could not be roused for duties so we all ate hotdogs and green peas warmed in the steam table for Christmas dinner; I had to spirit the cook off in an unscheduled trip to keep the crew from doing him harm; and so forth.
Yet, the cold north wind pushed water out of the bays and swamps and uncovered natural oyster beds that had not been touched in years. For several days after Christmas we fattened ourselves on fresh and fried Louisiana oysters right from the beds. Oooyeh.
It's an ill holiday wind that blows no good.

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