For executives, the floating school concept provides an opportunity to undertake an intensive study period that will provide them with insights and knowledge unlikely to be found in a traditional lecture theater.

CNN: 'Scholar Ship' ready to set sail

The 2011 study offers an intensive analysis of air pollution in more than 900 counties and more than 200 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA) and Combined Statistical Areas (CSA), or cities and their surrounding suburbs.

FORBES: List: America's Most Polluted Cities

Mathieu's quick rise to stardom parallels that of the honey badger, an animal that was little understood until the mid-1990s when Keith and Colleen Begg undertook the first intensive study of it.

WSJ: Tyrann Mathieu, LSU's Honey Badger, Stalks the Heisman