Public Relations

Atlantis One is an underwater research facility that is currently being designed by freshman at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The facility will be located in the Great Blue Hole of the Belize Barrier Reef and will be used for geological and biological study. The project will benefit the scientific community tremendously because it will allow the scientists to live in the realm which they are attempting to study. While they are living on site they will have full access to state-of-the-art laboratories and computers which will allow them to maximize their efficiency and thus cut the costs needed for research. This research will help mankind by providing new information about an environment that could possibly hold the keys to unlock the cures for certain types of cancer and AIDS. Though the main goal of the project is to research sedimentation and underwater biological processes, the facility will also help to raise public awareness of the ocean and studies that are taking place in it.

As part of our public relations protocol, we have compiled a list of frequently asked questions and created press releases and a brochure. We also contacted many companies and organizations asking if they would like to publicize our project. As of now, negotiations are still in progress with NBC, ABC, CBS, the New England Aquarium, and the Discovery Channel. National Geographic agreed to write an article on Atlantis One and its research, though. Also still in negotiations is the Atlantis One Pen Pal Project with Wilson Middle School in Natick, Massachusetts. The project is a way for students to learn about research first hand by corresponding with scientists living on Atlantis One. After a year of correspondence, one of the scientists would visit the school and give a presentation about research on Atlantis One.

In terms of funding, we have corresponded with many different companies and organizations who we asked to fund the project. Financial negotiations are still in progress.

List of Companies and Organizations

Also check out our press releases!

Fundraising

The funding research was taken to the point that we felt was reasonable given the fact that the Atlantis Projects are hypothetical. After researching where funding for other such projects comes from, we discovered that most funding, especially funding for building the station, comes from the public sector. However, while research is in progress more of the money will come from private funding and the researchers themselves. Upon this discovery, we sent out letters to private and public groups and received many replies, many of them advising us on where we might obtain the appropriate funding for our project. We also visited the Associated Grant Makers Boston Office and learned there how to use their computer system. This put us in a position such that all we needed to do to get the required funding was send letters with our abstracts and budget out groups that we think might be interested in granting us money for our project. Since we do not intend to actually build Atlantis One, these letters were not sent.

We also have a sample fundraising letter that you can look at.