Last day of class

It's not Hogwarts, but Miller Hall on the University of Washington campus where H and I have been access students this quarter in Oceanography 101. The final is next Wednesday ---but not for us! (anyone over 60 can enroll in a class for a very small fee if there's room in the class...We have taken mostly Art and NW history classes...just go listen, learn and don't write papers or take tests!)
Ocean 101 was a great class even tho we missed a bunch of the lectures and didn't go to the labs. But we could read or listen to the lectures on the internet. In my college days we were told to bring a bluebook to the final - today the students were told to bring a scantron sheet! It's seems to me the students are getting smarter and more serious. It's much more difficult to get admitted as an instate student. (5 out of 6 in our family have UW degrees, from awhile ago....I think it's going to be harder if not impossible for those grandchildren.)
The last lectures dealt with a very real and current issue, just in the news here last week - about how the shellfish population is being diminished by the acidification of the ocean happening all over the globe but especially here, right now. (I could tell you why, but it's too long) There is more CO2 in the air, which goes into the ocean which lowers the pH of the water so there is less carbonate to form shells for oysters, clams, mussels and coral. Washington and Oregon are the chief suppliers of shellfish which has been in trouble for the last few years (the young ones are not surviving), but now is getting to be dramatic. There is also research going on to explore how to store CO2 in the deep part of the ocean. So much we don't understand about this huge resource yet.

Sigh. Yet another world catastrophe to worry about.