My Dive into Coral Restoration: Becoming a Reef Renewal Diver in Curaçao

If you’re new to this blog, then I am Mia DaPonte and I share my life underwater with you after I got certified as the youngest female Master Scuba Diver in the USA! I was also chosen to be a member of the 2025 PADI Jr. AmbassaDiver team. Our AmbassaDiver motto is “Seek Adventure. Save the Ocean.” That means we want everyone to experience the amazing world beneath the waves — and take care of it at the same time.

You can also follow me and all my adventures on Instagram: @underwaterwithmia.

Recently, my mom and I went on a trip to Curaçao on a diving vacation with our Dive on It Scuba family. We spent the whole week diving and exploring. I’ll share my Curaçao adventure with you in my next blog because today I’m here to talk about something really special I got to do while we were away.

If you’ve read my blogs, you know I’m passionate about saving the corals. In Curaçao, they have a PADI course in coral restoration, and I got my PADI Coral Restoration Diver Specialty certification!

I got certified through an organization called Reef Renewal Curaçao, and the manager, Tripp Funderburk, was the instructor for my class.

To get the certification, I did some classwork to understand the mission. We need to save the corals to save our reefs. They are getting diseases and dying or bleaching because the water is getting too warm for them to survive. I’m scared to grow up and dive and see no corals anywhere, so as a diver, I want to help save our coral reefs. There are ways we can all help—even if you’re not a scuba diver.

On my first day of training, I learned how to handle corals and hang small cut-up pieces of coral on a nursery tree. It’s not an actual tree, but a big rod with other rods sticking out like branches. The reason for this is to keep them safe while they grow. I learned how to clean the corals on the trees with a brush while they were growing.

The second day was the next part of coral farming. We went to the coral trees that had a lot of corals that had been growing for a while, cut down the healthy big pieces, and brought them over to a square tray made out of bamboo. We took the coral and zip-tied it to the bamboo square so it could grow and make a type of coral home for fish. To do this, we had to place as much coral as we could on the bamboo and fit it all together like a puzzle. When we were done, I had planted my very own little coral garden that I can go back and watch grow!

Each day after we did our coursework, Tripp took us on a tour of the corals. There are Elkhorn corals and Staghorn corals—the Staghorns are the ones I got to work with. We got to swim through and see all the growth and healthy corals, which made me so happy to see. They’re doing so much work to save the corals—it was amazing to see all the corals growing everywhere.

The coral conservation course was the best experience, and I’m so happy that I got certified in it. I really want to do everything I can to help save our reefs. I have a few ideas, so stay tuned to see what happens next!

I would love to start helping coral restoration through my blog and ask if anyone would like to donate and support Reef Renewal Curaçao’s work. Tripp, the interns, and volunteers spend days in the gardens keeping them healthy and clean. Let’s help them if you can!

I’ve included lots of pictures here so you can see all the hard work!

Sea you soon! Thank you for reading!