Even though she’s technically retired, Ms. Acton has been incredibly busy. Back in August she received her Ocean Stewardship Certification with Barnegat Bay Partnership after 6 months of attending seminars. She goes out to Long Beach Island frequently, working with an educational group and going to classes along the coast, teaching about conservation and the clams, oysters, and scallops she farms and harvests. 

At Sedge Island, she and her team plant clams. She also helps manage an upweller, where bay water filters in and out of a tank to create an ideal environment for baby oysters and scallops to develop. She and her team monitor the growth of the shellfish in the upweller. There’s an island off of Beach Haven, a town on LBI where they also plant oysters. The oyster population is able to increase, and a reef is created to protect the island from erosion.

Aside from her work in conservation, Ms. Acton plans to begin teaching after-school art classes for kids in her community. Rather than having a traditional classroom setting, she’ll organize 1-on-1 drawing and watercolor lessons at students’ homes. She prefers this type of setting because it’s “more nurturing and personal to do it one on one.”

She also has been doing more watercolors of her own, especially of plants in the Pine Barrens. She and her family are all well. She still goes on bike rides every day and keeps an eye on the ducks at Taunton Lake.