Sunday, December 20, 2009

Halfway point (roughly)

B and I are at a bed and breakfast in Athol, on our respective computers, listening to a pack of howling dogs. We spent today in the Village, hoping to get out. All week we’d been debating whether to leave on Friday night or wait until today, Saturday. If we’d left last night we’d be safely out of the Village, but would have to spend two nights here in Athol, at least one at a hotel (and nothing is cheap here, including hotel rooms). Waiting until today, however, put us at a slightly higher risk of running into bad weather. Which in fact happened. We started calling the airlines at 9:00 this morning, and all day long it was, “We’re on a weather hold, call back in an hour.” It was actually sort of nice to have a day of just sitting around watching movies all day, but our baseline stress level was very high – if we didn’t make it out at some point today, we’d either miss our flight to Anchorage tomorrow, or have to pay to take a later flight. Finally at 4 two airlines decided to send planes. I couldn’t believe it – it really hadn’t seemed that bad out earlier in the day, a little overcast maybe, but calm. As the day went on, it seemed to get both hazier and windier. As excited as I was to hear that a plane was coming, I was dreading the ride.

Our neighbor drove us down to the airstrip. The plane was a big one, a ten-seater. We had to stop in the Bay first to pick up 7 more people including a few small children, one of whom was a baby with what smelled like a soiled diaper. All things considered, I guess the ride wasn’t that bad…I don’t know, I don’t like these tiny planes, I don’t like flying at all, and the wind made it bumpy and it was getting dark and it smelled, and I kept feeling alternately nauseous and light-headed. It was not a fun trip. I was very, very thankful when we finally landed in Athol. We took a taxi to a Chinese restaurant (a restaurant! No cooking! No dishes!) and called J, a very friendly lady who is our assigned mentor through the district. She had offered us a place to stay for the night, which we assumed would be her house, but which turned out to be the lovely bed and breakfast her partner built and owns. We passed an hour chatting with an older woman on her way out to visit her son in a different village, and are now settled into our very cozy room. The owner’s dog team is outside, and apparently something set them off, because they are all howling and barking.

This past week of school went pretty quickly, there were lots of holiday things to do, including a Christmas show and a feast yesterday. The kids aren’t really excited about Christmas, I don’t think many of them get a whole lot of gifts and I imagine it gets boring fast with no school. Two weeks of sitting around playing video games and watching movies really isn’t that fun, even to a kid. The teachers, on the other hand, were exhibiting varying degrees of giddiness yesterday afternoon at the prospect of getting out for a while. Even the veteran teachers seem to have some cabin fever, and I know B and I were starting to consider the possibility today that we might not get out at all, and feeling utterly depressed.

Tomorrow afternoon we fly on to Anchorage, and from there we take a red-eye to Boston, with a layover in Minneapolis at some unholy hour of the morning. Besides the obvious things like seeing our families and celebrating Christmas, we’re both also very excited to do some of the things we haven’t been able to do for months, like drive a car, drink some wine, impulse-buy some stuff, eat ice cream, see people we don’t know, and maybe even go to the movies. Pretty exciting stuff.

I wish I had some insightful or deep reflections at this rather important marker of our time, our halfway point, but not really. We certainly haven’t changed our minds at all about spending more than a year up here. We love the kids and we’re both learning a lot, but you know that already if you’ve been reading this blog. We’re looking forward to getting back to Portland in a serious way, and one thing that I hope will last is the sense of appreciation I know we’ll feel when we first get back there, for things we used to take for granted. We just cannot wait to ride our bikes, to play Frisbee in the park, to eat grilled cheese and waffle tacos and fried pie at the food carts, to drink tea (and coffee and beer) with our friends, to walk in Forest Park, to stroll down to Alberta Street for coffee and bagels on a Sunday morning with our dog, to shop at the coop, to go to vegan restaurants, to go running outside, to work in our garden…oh, man. It’s making me sad just writing this list.

I don’t think either one of us would say we’re sorry we decided to do this. We both have moments where we’re sort of miserable, but we had those in Portland every once in a while, too. I think in the long run we’ll be glad we had this year, whereas if we hadn’t come I think we would’ve regretted that choice. All the same, it’s a bit of a relief to be halfway done.

Here’s one list a few of you might be interested in: the books I’ve read since we arrived. Some of you may recognize titles as ones you recommended in response to my earlier request. Some titles are books that were at the BIA (our housing unit), some were sent by friends or families, and some we brought with us. They’re in the order in which I read them:

Death, With Interruptions by Jose Saramago (I started this one on the east coast)

Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Anil’s Ghost by Michael Ondaatje

City of Tiny Lights by Patrick Neale

Mindset by Carol Dweck

Accordion Crimes by E. Annie Proulx

The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks

Volcano by Shusaku Endo

Mother Jones: The Most Dangerous Woman in America by Elliott Gorn

The Man in the High Castle by Phillip K. Dick

Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Road to Wellville by T.C. Boyle

Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle

Coming into the Country by John McPhee

Jonah’s Gourd Vine by Zora Neale Hurston

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Disobedience by Jane Hamilton

East of Eden by John Steinbeck

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Hanna’s Daughters by Marianne Frederiksson

The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs

The Geographer’s Library by Jon Fasman

The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff

Run by Ann Patchett

The Know-it-All by A.J. Jacobs

The Way the Crow Flies by Ann-Marie MacDonald

Teaching What Really Happened by James Loewen

Nothing to be Frightened Of by Julian Barnes (I’m about halfway through this one)

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Q&A

A good friend of mine sent these questions because he wanted more details. I sent him back some answers:

do you watch a lot of Internet tv? No. The home Internet connection is too slow and we can't use up that sort of bandwidth at school. We download (through iTunes) the Daily Show and the Simpsons overnight. S gave me the complete Six Feet Under for my birthday so we're working on that. We also rock the Netflix. You can get spotty satellite TV here but we don't do that.
have you had any fish? Not really. I think there was some in one of the akutaqs I had. I caught a fish though.
are you lesson planning all night? No. I only teach one class that I have to lesson plan for. Otherwise I help out in other people's classes or see kids in small groups or one-on-one. S has three classes to lesson prep for but she's been getting that done without having to go in on the weekends lately. Most of the other teachers come up to school on the weekends. We have to turn in our lesson plans every week to the principal which can be pretty time consuming. I spend a lot of time doing paperwork but I know when all that stuff is due literally a year in advance so I just get it done early.
are you and S at each others necks? We were for a little while. There was a two week period in October or so in which we were really driving each other nuts. We spend a huge amount of time with each other and we have known for a long time that this doesn't really work for us. We each need to be doing our own things at times. That doesn't happen much here. I started teaching afterschool in the evenings twice a week in November and S just started coaching basketball. Things had gotten better before that but now we have some time apart so we're doing really well. .
are there B&B igloos you can rent for a romantic retreat? No igloos of any kind any where here. No B&B's, restaurants, movie theaters, cafes, bars, etc. Not in the village. I think there's a B&B in Athol. Athol is not romantic. We'll be in Anchorage for New Year's and staying in a B&B. That should be good.
where will you be for winter break? In MA/NH from this Monday to the 31st. You?
what are you reading? I just finished Guns, Germs and Steel. It took me forever to slog through it but it was worth it. I read the Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (or Cavalier and Klay - one of those). It was a great, great book. Just started two books: Lost at School (Ross Greene) and Coming into the Country (about Alaska in the '70s). What are you reading?
what's the last fresh thing you ate? Every week we actually get a box of fresh veggie/fruits from a CSA from Washington state that broke into the business of shipping their boxes to rural Alaska by freight. It's expensive but it rules.
did you run out of anything? Besides fun stuff to do and people to talk to? We run out of stuff at times. We order most of our food from Azure Standard or Fred Meyer. Some also from Vegan Essentials who will ship cold stuff (like soy butter).
like tea bags or soy butter? We bought a case of earth balance sticks and a case of earth balance tubs. It's lasted so far. We get loose tea from the Tao of Tea in Portland.
is there anything you have way too much of? Almonds. We have two cases. We were going to make almond milk but our soy milk maker works so well we don't need to. We have almonds with lunch every day and put them in salads, etc but we we're only 1/2 through the first case. Also, chick peas. We used to eat them all the time but the ones we bought were dried. We soak them for a day then boil them for hours and then have to individually peel each one. We did this a few times and then gave up. We have 25 pounds of chickpeas hanging out here.
what's the one thing you brought that was a huge waste of space that you never use? Shorts. I brought them because we went right from the west coast to the east coast in August and then I thought I would wear them some up here. I wore shorts maybe twice. They just sit in the drawer. S was smart and left hers on the east coast. Not much else actually. We tried to bring very little up here.
do you have windows? Two big ones facing the school (with a third boarded up - it was broken last year and never replaced).
do you wish you didn't? No. We can see the sunrise and watch the weather and people go by on Hondas. But it was kind of pain when the weather was nice and the kids would come by every day to look in and see what we were doing.
where does your poop go? Good question. We have flushing toilets. I think there's a big septic tank. Not all of the village has this however. Many of them have honey buckets that they empty into the ocean. Now that it's frozen the contents of the bucket just sit frozen on the ice.
have you seen wildlife? Some. Lots of birds and fish. We saw musk ox from the plane. There are foxes around now but we haven't seen any yet. The ones that come into the village are usually rabid. Moose don't hang out here- they were killed off by hunting.
have you eaten with local families? We haven't been inside anyone's house. No one really gets invited over. We have had community feasts. This is mostly the school feeding everyone. We have one coming up on friday.
have you decided to never return to portland? No. We can't wait to get back there.
do you have a beard? No. Maybe after Christmas.
any music that you've come to listen to more than anything else? S and I were listening to a lot of Mountain Goats, Songs Ohia and Iron & Wine. Also Animal Collective and Panda Bear. Lately we started listening to Bon Iver and the new Bill Callahan. I've really been enjoying Sigur Ross lately and trying to get into the Arcade Fire with limited results. Rudresh Mahanthappa is a saxophonist that I've been liking lately. I'm trying to like Yo la Tengo and that's going pretty well. I need some new noise and free jazz stuff. I've struck out a bit lately finding any thing I'm really excited about.
any music that you've come to hate? Nothing I could name. The kids play this one song all the time that I hate. I can't even remember how it goes or who it's by. It's very bad hip hop/R&B crap.
how's S? Good. About the same as me: ready for a break from this place. I think she's enjoyed doing some special ed stuff but I think she also misses having hear own class all day.
do you love being her boss? do you boss her around? is that working out? I'm not really her boss of course. I'm in a full time special ed position, S is in a 1/2 general ed and 1/2 special ed position. Special ed is new to S so sometimes she asks me about working with certain kids. I do all of the sped paperwork and run the IEP meetings. I'm hardly her boss. I do enjoy saying that I'm the head of the sped department though.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Global warming

Here's an interesting entry from the NY Times blog Green, Inc about how global warming is affecting Native Alaskans. A slightly more in-depth perspective than B's student.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Iqmik

Iqmik is widely chewed by students at The Village school. One of first days here, students were openly chewing when we were hanging out by the river. E thinks that a lot of the students start to have withdrawal symptoms part way through the day causing grumpiness that leads to the students getting themselves in trouble. I don't know how many students chew - estimates range but in the area it seems to be around 10%. Parents openly share with children including teething babies. Here's an article about it:

"What is iqmik?

That's the Yupik word for a mixture of long-cut, fire-cured Kentucky tobacco and the ash of a fungus (Phellinus igniarius) that grows on birch trees in the Y-K Delta [Yukon-Kuskokwim] . Locals mix ash from the fungus, commonly called "punk ash," with tobacco for chewing. Often, they pre-masticate the mixture and place it in a small box, where it is shared with others, including children and sometimes teething babies. If birch fungus is not available, they might use the ash of alder or willow.

The practice is not new. European traders introduced tobacco to Natives in the Y-K Delta in the 1700s. By the 1800s, its use was widespread. No one is sure how long Natives have used iqmik, but it is prevalent in the region.

Users believe iqmik tastes better and is healthier than commercial chewing tobacco because it has no additives. Researchers estimate iqmik users outnumber commercial tobacco users 2-to-1.

But iqmik is actually more detrimental, said Caroline Cremo Renner, director of nicotine research and control for YKHC [Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Center]. She called the "high" or "buzz" users get a form of nicotine poisoning. Researchers believe the ash raises the pH level in the mouth, which increases the dose and enhances delivery of nicotine to the brain. In effect, the user is freebasing nicotine.

Overall, the smokeless tobacco use rate among Y-K Delta Alaska Natives is 52 percent versus 2 percent nationally. . .

Renner called tobacco use in the region a "pediatric epidemic." In research for a masters thesis, she found iqmik use common among teens and children as young as 5. Tobacco contributes to poor oral health, and some users have lost their teeth in adolescence, she said. Because Yupiks sometimes name babies for someone who has recently died, infants are occasionally given iqmik, in belief their namesake would still be craving it.

Even more disturbing is that YKHC research of medical charts shows 82 percent of pregnant women in the region use tobacco -- 61 percent chew iqmik or a commercial tobacco and 21 percent smoke. Nationally, the smokeless tobacco use rate for pregnant women is under 1 percent. . .

Mayo Clinic staffers have traveled to Bethel four times this year, and senior leadership officials of the regional hospital in Bethel have been to the Mayo Clinic. Hurt said Mayo Clinic staffers also met with the Alaska Native Health Board in Anchorage."

I talked to a student recently about iqmik because I caught her chewing in class. I told her that it's cancer causing and that she has to be especially careful when/if she is pregnant. Her response, "Our mom iqmik'ed with us and we're fine." She is fine actually - good grades, stays out of trouble (this incident aside) and in the right grade for her age. But that's beside the point. Unfortunately, at 15, your personal anecdotal experience trumps science.

Sunrise

10:34 am. My kids have already read 2 chapters in their novel, written in their reading journals, practiced our song for the holiday show, had a lesson on how to use Microsoft Word, and started typing their book reviews. The sky over the northern hills is just beginning to glow pink.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Do qassaqs liq?

So a few days ago in class, one of my students leaned over a little and ripped a giant fart. Not uncommon. Unlike kids in other places, the kids here are totally unembarrassed about bodily functions. They cough up big wads of phlegm loudly, they belch and yawn and fart and announce, "I have to anuk (poop)!" On the one hand I kind of like this, you know? Screw being embarrassed about stuff your body just does naturally. On the other hand, ew! So anyway on this particular day this student farted out loud, then kind of laughed at the sound, and I gave her one of my teacher-y LOOKs. She said, "Excuse me," and I started to go on with the lesson, when another student called out, "Do qassaqs liq?" I know the word qassaq, it means white person, but liq (pronounced sort of like "luck") was a new one. "Do qassaqs what?" I said. "Do they liq - you know..." and she gestured toward the student who'd farted. "Do we fart? Um...of course," I said. "Well how come we never hear you?" she asked. "Uhh...I guess I try to keep it to myself." "Why?" "Uh...um...SO, about long vowels..."

It's certainly interesting how strong our social conditioning can be. I would have JUST DIED if I'd ever farted out loud in school. And even now, I'd certainly be embarrassed (depsite my students' "encouragement").

What's also of note is this idea, this perception that the kids have, of qassaqs being completely other. I guess I figured, they've met plenty of white people, we won't be that exotic. But they have lots of questions about qassaq stuff, and I've been called out for being "so qassaq-y" (can't remember what I was doing at the time to warrant that comment, probably nothing I'd think of as super-white). It's not a totally new feeling for me, though. When I worked in Harlem I had plenty of moments where I realized the kids (mostly Hispanic, African-American, and African) saw me as a representative of basically a different species. Despite living in one of the most diverse cities in the world, they had very little understanding of the idea of all people sharing some fundamental sameness.

Many Native cultures have names for themselves that reflect a self-concept of their own ethnic group as more authentic versions of people - names that essentially mean "people" or "real people." I believe the Nez Perce called themselves "Mahopa" which means "people" and Yup'ik means "real people." This idea, of being somehow more "real" than other people, combined with continued insularity (insulation?) from other cultures (no matter in the city, the suburbs, or on the tundra) is what creates and perpetuates the sense of other peoples as "other" people.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

"It's global warming really super hard"

This is what one of my 9th graders said to me yesterday. The students are saying it's more like May than December with a high of 40 the other day and temperatures above 30 for most of the week (that's without wind chill factored in of course) and all of the sea ice melting. That doesn't sound like May to me but I agree that it's global warming really super hard anyway. (Though random fluctuation of day-to-day temperatures is not really evidence of global warming, of course.)

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Looking forward

Unlike in the other school districts I've worked in, the winter break really is the half way mark for the school year. I have to say that I'm looking forward to the two weeks off more than I have in a long time. I'm really psyched to go some place that is not The Village or Athol and I'm really looking forward to new things. I know "things" is a really vague term but it's accurate nonetheless. There is not much 'new' here on a daily basis. It's the same people and the same place and all of the same objects. This is probably why I've taken to listening to a ton of podcasts and doing a lot of Internet reading - at least I can get some new information and ideas. I'm really looking forward to seeing people I don't know at all, eating food I haven't had in months, seeing unfamiliar landscapes or really anything at all.
So I can't wait to be in the Anchorage airport and then the Minneapolis airport. That sounds amazing to me. Lots of people and places to go! I nearly wrote that "I am built for cities" but that's not the whole story (though most likely that's a part of it). You have to hunker down in Alaska during the winter or you have to be psyched about being cold. Really, really cold. We've opted for hunkering. I'll be very happy to un-hunker for a bit while on vacation.

Monday, November 30, 2009

Nothing Left to Add

Today, the wind was blowing almost 50 mph bring the temperature down to -30. Here's the gear I wore to walk to school (reminder: it's maybe two hundred yards at most):

- snow boots
- snow pants
- huge parka
- mittens
- neck warmer
- ear warmer
- hat
- goggles
- work clothes

So that's it. I have nothing else to add if it gets any colder.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

NY Times article, Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all (both?) of our blog readers. Yesterday the kids had a half day of school and at noon there was a "feast" in the cafeteria. It was interesting - practically the whole village was there. Because the population here is so small, the families tend to be very intertwined, and when you add the casual adoptions that take place in many families and the way people who actually aren't related call each other their "Yup'ik cousins", well, pretty much everyone is family. Most of my interactions here are with the younger kids so it was nice to be able to match younger siblings with older, and children with adults. The feast itself was a little strange, it was all school food, with the teachers serving, which our neighbor E likened to a soup kitchen kind of environment - it did have a bit of a condescending feeling to it, and B commented that it would have been more of a community-building activity if it had been a potluck style thing. Still, the families seemed glad to be there and it really was a treat for me to see everyone together like that. In general Thanksgiving doesn't hold much relevance for the people here, at least not the kids. They were kind of vague and confused about the meaning and history of the holiday, and even more so when it came to their own celebrations. Which makes sense, since as my dad pointed out, the history of Thanksgiving is this nice story about two cultures coming together to share and help each other out, when in fact one of those cultures ended up just about wiping out the other. So as indigenous people maybe the community here doesn't find a lot to celebrate. But I actually think it's more that the people up here don't have a strong sense of being American, at least not in the way that I think many of us in the lower 48 do.

Later today a group of the teachers (all of us who live in the BIA) are getting together to eat, along with OFL and his wife K. B and I made: corn bread, pumpkin bread, pumpkin pie, apple-peanut butter-caramel bars, Tofurkey, green bean casserole, broccoli, and sweet potato puree. Should be a good meal. I don't think there will be any other vegan items on the table so my feelings are kind of torn between my love of sharing food I've made with others, and being annoyed that everyone can try our food while we can't eat any of theirs. Hopefully my more generous side will win out.

One other thing, my friend Holly sent me an interesting article from the New York Times website yesterday, about rural schools in Alaska. Many of them are closing for lack of students. Our Village isn't in that dire of a situation yet, but I do see that kind of situation in the future for many of the villages. The culture has been pushed aside by western values and technology to a pretty serious degree, such that many of the children here don't have a strong desire to stick around when they grow up. The language, though it's taught in the schools, is nonetheless being lost. So this article was, in my opinion, a look at what will happen to many schools and many villages if things keep going the way they are.

I know that's kind of a downer on a day we're supposed to be thankful, so I'll end with a short list of a few of the many things I'm thankful for:

  • B (Besides his many wonderful qualities, there's the fact that I honestly don't know if I'd make it through a year up here alone).
  • Family and friends, who've made a point of staying in touch and keeping us feeling connected while we're away.
  • Mail.
  • My parka, which so far has kept me warm even in the chilliest of wind chills.
  • Full Circle Farms CSA, for sustaining us with fresh vegetables every week.
  • E, for being a good friend to us here and for having all the Wes Anderson movies on his computer.
  • Children, for being utterly unique, yet so much the same no matter where you go.
  • Tofurkey.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Pictures and cold

Here are some new pictures to give you an idea of what early winter looks like in The Village. There's not much snow yet, maybe 3-6 inches (it piles and drifts because of the wind). Last year they got about 20 feet - most of it after the new year. I'm just hoping that whenever it comes this year it doesn't mess with our December travel plans.

Anyway - it doesn't look too wintry yet, I think because you can still see tundra grass sticking up through the snow. However, though it may be early in the season, it is already by far the coldest weather I've ever experienced. Today coming up to school the wind was blowing like crazy, for a wind chill of -25. We really couldn't look straight ahead but had to keep our eyes down (tomorrow we'll remember our goggles), and the wind almost blew me over once or twice. B actually did take a spill when he accidentally stepped off the boardwalk and into a snowdrift that was deeper than he expected (in his defense, he was wearing his glasses which immediately frosted over so he really couldn't see anything).

The good news is, so far it seems we're well-prepared as far as gear goes. The skin around my eyes was my only exposed part this morning, and the only part of me that felt cold. So I'm happy for that and hoping my jacket, boots, snow pants and everything else continue to keep me warm as the weather gets colder.

Friday, November 20, 2009

Since I've Been Here I Haven't:

- ridden a bike (the stationary one in the "Fitness Club doesn't count)#
- driven a car#
- played music with anyone%
- seen anyone I met before July 2009#
- been to the movies
- been to a grocery store%
- played frisbee
- done any work in behavior support (my area of expertise -such as it is)#
- eaten ice cream#

I have
- gone fishing+
- driven a 4-wheeler+
- watched a seal get 'cleaned'*
- walked across the tundra to the nearest village*
- flew in a 6-person airplane*
- ridden in the trailer of a 4-wheeler*
- done the Indian Stick Pull (and strained my back in the process)*
- taught algebra*
- experienced 50 mph winds*
- made my own soy milk*
- grown alfalfa sprouts*
- eaten Eskimo ice cream*

Key:
+ denotes first time since I was a kid
* denotes 1st time ever
# denotes something I did daily before moving here
% denotes something I did weekly before moving here

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Forth, and fear no darkness!

Today is Sunday, November 15. The sun rose today at 10:01 am and will set at 5:28pm. For the next 5 weeks or so, we have a lot more darkness coming. On the winter solstice, the sun will rise at 11:08am and set at 4:48pm. Now, keep in mind that we live among several hills, so it takes a while for us to actually see the sun, even after it has technically risen, and likewise, it goes down behind the hill to the south well before the official sunset. It's been amazing to watch the arc of the sun get smaller every day. The light never feels strong or full because the sun is always slanting down at us these days - never directly overhead.

Just to give you some comparison, on the day we arrived in Tununak (Friday, August 7), the sun rose at 6:51am and set at 11:21pm. And on the summer solstice, the sunrise was at 5:29am, while sunset was at 12:35am.

And in the way of further comparison, today in Portland the sun rose at 7:09am and set at 4:41pm. So as you can see, it's the morning that's really killer. When we walk to school at 8am it is absolutely middle-of-the-night pitch black. About two weeks ago we started bringing our camping headlamp for the walk up the stairs to school (we also put our cleats on our boots, but that's a different matter). If it's clear, the stars are actually pretty amazing at this time of the morning, but it's too cold to stay out and look for very long.

And speaking of cold, yesterday for the first time we got really, super bundled up. We've been postponing the use of our heavy-duty winter gear as long as possible so that we would still have something warmer to put on when it went from cold to "holy s**t" cold. I think we're still well away from that level but it is definitely getting pretty chilly and we wanted to test out our gear. So, I have a Mountain Hardwear Subzero women's parka. I put on long underwear, jeans, snowpants, fleece socks, my snow boots, a fleece jacket, fleece scarf, and my parka. I skipped a hat because my jacket has a serious hood. I also have gore-tex fleece lined mittens. So we both got all suited up and we were waiting for E to get ready (we were all going to walk to the post office) and I was sweating bullets. I thought once we got outside I’d cool down but I actually had to loosen my hood and scarf about halfway there because I was so hot! It was a relief because it means it can get a lot colder and we’ll still be warm enough. However, I have to admit that yesterday was very sunny and not at all windy, which helped. Today I walked up to school and on the way back home the wind felt like a knife. It really hurts to have anything exposed in wind like that, and I didn't have my scarf, so I had to hold up my hand to block the right side of my face while I walked.

So, how are we planning to get through this long, cold winter? Lots of tea, lots of games, lots of music practice, lots of movies, lots and lots of books. Letter-writing, phone calls, Wii, bread baking (baking in general) and, hopefully, the occasional letter or package from the lower 48.

On that final note, just want to say thanks for all the mail lovin' we're getting. It's hard to express how exciting it is to get a package or even a letter. We miss home and our "real life" so much and mail is like a little connection to that. We've been very spoiled by our parents who've sent us tons of goodies, and our friends have also sent us amazing care packages filled with books, chocolate, coffee, games, tea, vegan treats, and even 1 dried sunflower. Thanks thanks!

(I'll just add that getting mail is SO exciting that even when I order something from Amazon, it usually takes so long to get here that I've half forgotten it by the time it arrives, and then I'm like, "Oh, a package...oh, look, it's a _______! Fantastic, I've been wanting that!" )

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Homework and Pants

Most of the students don't carry bags back and forth to school. They usually stick their homework in their pants' pocket and usually have it done by the time it's due. The other day a student stayed after school to get some missing work done. He hasn't been doing his homework much lately so when I suggested he spend his time working on that I figured he'd say he lost it or left it somewhere. Instead, it was in his pants pocket. He took it out and got most of it done in fifteen minutes.
A lot of the houses in town don't have running water. The families in these houses have to use the expensive and disgusting village laundromat. We have laundry facilities in our apartment. These facts may be why the the students often notice and remark that I wear different clothes to school every day. Conversely, I notice that they usually wear the same clothes all week. My method is good for conforming to "down-states" standards of smelling and looking acceptable for work; theirs is good for saving money, avoiding a trip to the laundromat and having your homework on you at all times.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Another Day

I woke up in the night to the sound of the wind. It's 50 mph today. Also, the alarm at the diesel generator for The Village went off at 5:15 AM. The alarm signifies that it's running short on fuel. This means that The Village was using the generator instead of the connection to another nearby village with wind turbines. The wind doesn't usually equate to losing power because there are no trees to knock down power lines. I don't know why we're using the back up.
The ocean, which is usually totally calm, is sporting double digit wave height and white caps. The students were complaining of being kept awake by the crashing waves all night.
As I write this it's 28 degrees out but the windchill brings it down to -1 (earlier the numbers were 29 and 4 with a 40 mph wind). You can see people getting blown around by the wind from the window in my classroom.
Just another day.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Alcohol

Since its introduction into their world, alcohol has been a constant source of destruction and sorrow for Alaska Natives. Experts have put forth any number of reasons as to why Alaska Natives become abusers of alcohol virtually at the same time that they become users. One theory suggests that because the chemical is new to the Alaska Native body, Natives lack the chemical and genetic capability to break alcohol down the way other races of people — with long exposure to it — can. Others believe that the answer is purely genetic: that is, many Alaska Natives are genetically predisposed to becoming addicted to alcohol whereas, in other races, those genetically predisposed have long since died out through alcohol-related deaths. Still others feel that the type of alcoholism prevalent among Alaska Natives, the so-called "binge drinking," is behavior learned from the trappers and miners and traders with whom Natives had initial contact.”

This quote is from a paper I found online here. I think the whole paper is worth reading to get a better idea of the way alcohol is affecting Native populations throughout Alaska. I can speak only to what I see here in the Village.

Last Wednesday almost half of our high school students were absent because the night before there had been a big party, and the kids were drinking. Absences due to drinking are very common, and I also hear from B and E (who both work in the upper school) that kids are often coming to school hungover or extremely exhausted from being out the night before. OFL tells us that he hears regularly from kids who are thinking of hurting or even killing themselves. Alcohol is a major problem in the village, and no one seems to have any idea how to address it.

A few weeks ago we had a community meeting up at the school to address the issue. Many adults are in agreement that this is a serious problem in the village. Some adults even pointed out that the people who are causing the problem are well known, but that there is no real enforcement of the village ordinance against alcohol. I left the meeting feeling, on the one hand, encouraged that so many adults had turned up and expressed concern, and on the other hand frustrated that no real ideas or action plans had been set forth.

Alcohol gets here in one of two ways: either people brew it themselves, or they buy it. I don’t know much about it but I have to assume that homebrew is the more common way of getting it, since to buy it is wildly expensive. A bottle of cheap whiskey, for example, something that might cost $10 at a liquor store, can fetch $200 here in the Village. However the villagers get it, they definitely have it. Kids as young as 8 or 9 make jokes and references to homebrew or to drinking in general.

I think part of the problem is the extreme isolation, and the lack of alternative activities. Part of it is modeling – if children grow up seeing the adults in the family abusing alcohol, then, genetic predisposition or no, there’s a good chance those children will drink when they grow up as well. Another part of the problems is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome – among the host of difficulties this causes, one is poor judgment skills, which make it more likely that someone with FAS will choose to drink and may, as a result, end up abusing alcohol themselves. Finally, I think a big part of the problem is a lack of education. Most of the kids seem to know that they shouldn’t drink, but have been given little or no training on how or why to avoid it. If I’m hearing my kids talk about, young as they are, then it seems to me that they should be getting educated about it.

Sometimes when B and E and I are sitting around having our nightly mugs of tea and we get on to this topic, I feel despair. Alcohol is a crafty and a wicked enemy, very hard to fight. To make things worse, Athol, the nearest city, recently voted to stop being a dry city. Everyone here expects that this will only increase the flow of illegal alcohol into the villages.

Here are a few more statewide statistics from the paper I quoted above that may help to express the severity of the problem. The paper is a little old at this point but I think the point is still made quite clearly.



• In fiscal year 1993, the state and federal governments spent approximately $13 million (not counting Medicaid, Medicare, or other third-party reimbursements) providing substance abuse programs for Alaska Natives;

• Between 1980 and 1989, once every 12 days an Alaska Native died from alcohol (i.e., alcohol being the primary cause of death), for a total of 305 Alaska Natives deaths attributable directly to alcohol;

• A majority of Native crimes for which Natives are serving jail time are alcohol related, and a majority of those crimes fall into categories deemed among the most violent: assault, sexual assault, sexual abuse of a minor, and murder/manslaughter;

• Initial findings of a special IHS/Alaska Native Health Board project indicate at-risk prenatal alcohol/drug exposure among Alaska Natives ranging from 14% to 78% by region in 1991;

• Though it is impossible using current numbers to clearly define the overall role alcohol plays in injury deaths, it can be established that, all other factors being equal, the rate at which alcohol is an underlying or a contributing cause of injury death among Alaska Natives is nearly triple that among non-Natives.

• "The commission finds a clear connection between the abuse of alcohol and the commission of criminal offenses in Alaska. This alcohol connection is particularly strong in rural areas and among Alaska Natives wherever situated. It is estimated that at least 75% of offenders have problems with substance abuse, and this figure is probably even higher for Native offenders."

• Alaska Natives have an FAS rate more than double the national average.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

NYO pictures

Here are a few pictures and videos of the NYO competition. They're not great - the lighting in the gym is terrible, plus the videos are so grainy - I'm not sure why. They look fine on our camera and on our computer but once I uploaded them they looked pretty bad. Anyone out there know how I can get better quality video online?

In any case you can still get an idea of what the competition was like. Enjoy.

Try

'Try' is a word that gets used in a unique way by the students. I don't know what they think it means. Maybe you can figure it out from these examples:

"Try look" - what is said when they want you to look at something
"Try smile" - what is said when they want you to smile
"Try sit" - what is said when they want you to sit down
"Try read it" - what is said when they want you to read something
"Try don't drink your tea" - what is said when they wanted S to not drink her morning tea just to see what would happen
"Try come" - what is said when they want you to come to them

That last one is the best. It gets used when you're busy helping one student and the other student gets impatient so he asks you to "try come". I want to say, "It's not for lack of effort that I haven't come to you yet."

I know what they're trying to say, but I don't know what you could substitute for 'try' in these sentences.

Note: This is not just used in a student-teacher situation. Student-student usage is common too.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

NYO, things we like, and cold


Last weekend our school hosted an NYO competition, and two other villages sent students to compete. NYO is Native Youth Olympics, a series of very challenging physical events. We didn’t see all of the events, but we were able to see a few and get some pictures. We’re not 100% sure about the origins of all the NYO events but it seems that at least some of them developed from hunting traditions. For example, the “Two Foot” involves a student standing with her feet together. She jumps and, keeping her feet together, kicks as high as she can, then lands on both feet. Apparently this and the “One Foot” (same type of thing, the obvious difference being you use one foot instead of two) were both ways that returning hunters could signal to the village whether or not the hunt had been successful. Some of the older boys can kick well above 6 feet, which is truly amazing to see. Other events simply test strength and endurance. The “Wrist Carry” seems to test your limits of tolerating pain: two students hold a dowel a little thicker than a broom handle, at about waist height. The competitor sits underneath it and wraps one arm around it so that he hangs by his wrist, then lifts himself off the ground. The two carriers walk slowly while the competitor hangs for as long as he can stand it. I think the winner came in at just under 30 seconds. It looks incredibly painful. On the other hand, the “One-Arm Reach” and the “One-Leg Reach” are more about strength and flexibility. In these events, you kind of get into a crow pose, like a squat where you then shift your weight to your arms and lift your body off the ground. Then you either reach up with one arm or one leg as high as you can. In all these reaching and kicking events there’s a ball dangling overhead to measure how high you’re going. When you miss the ball three times in a row, you’re out.

Similar to the dancing, NYO was very laid-back. In fact when we first entered the gym it was hard to even tell that there was a competition going on. The only clapping occurs when someone gets out – which is kind of nice, actually. Our team placed first in both the junior high and high school categories, and it was really nice to get to see the kids out of the usual context of the classroom. For me, seeing them achieve in other ways always helps me have more patience and more affection for them than when I insist on only knowing them as “my” students. This was especially true this time, as this competition involved several of my junior-high age students. I think I’ve said before that I was a little caught off guard when I volunteered to teach the 5th-grade level math class and ended up with 13 and 14 year old kids. It’s an age group I don’t really love and don’t feel super comfortable with, so it was particularly nice to be able to see some of these kids, who often frustrate me in class, perform with seriousness and skill in a different area.

Okay, onto something a little lighter. Mail continues to be a high point of our week, and there are definitely things that are particularly wonderful to get. If you’re thinking of sending up some mail, here are some ideas:


• puzzles or games
• photos
• cans of soup/chili/other instant stuff (we obviously never go out to eat and it’s nice every once in a while to not have to cook a meal. We wouldn’t want to be living off of instant stuff but you know, now and then…)
• books (especially books you don’t necessarily want back)
• sweets (anyone who knows us knows we have both have a terrible sweet tooth. Don’t indulge us too much, but maybe a little bar of dark chocolate?)
• letters (as opposed to emails – nothing wrong with emails and phone calls, it’s just also nice to get a real letter now and then)
• interesting or unusual spices or sauces (virtually all our meals are grain + vegetable + bean or tofu or seitan. It’s nice to be able to vary the flavors.)

I think that’s it! I’m pretty sure we’ve said this already but just in case you were thinking about it, do not send alcohol of any kind – we’re in a dry village, it’s illegal in any case to mail it in Alaska, and we’d be immediately fired, no questions asked, if we got caught with it. I felt nervous eating a chocolate with an orange liquor filling the other day.

One final thing. It is starting to get cold in a serious way. The days are down in the 30s and the wind is fierce at times. This past Saturday B and I took the school’s Honda to the post office and on the way back the wind was in our faces. I just had to put my face against B’s back and close my eyes. I don’t really know how B’s face didn’t just freeze and fall off. It made me kind of nervous about the winter. I don’t think we have any idea what kind of cold we’re in for.

Oh, and - I'll try to get some pictures and videos up of NYO stuff soon. We do finally have Internet at our house but it's incredibly slow, so uploading stuff is a major task. But we'll get around to it this weekend maybe.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Fun with Culture

I have a 5 year old on my caseload who has to learn things like colors, grouping similar objects and understanding opposites. We use file folder games, among other things, so that he thinks we're playing when he's actually learning. The other day we were sorting breakfast foods and lunch/dinner foods. The foods were typical American fare: hamburgers, eggs, bacon, toast, etc. However, this student lives with his 75 year old grandfather who can't cook. Apparently they eat frozen food warmed up in the microwave for most of their meals. Needless to say, sorting breakfast foods from lunch/dinner foods was not trivial for this student.
Another day this week the same student chose to do a game in which he had to sort winter items from summer items. However, there's no time of year in which he would wear a swimsuit because it's never warm enough to swim. Additionally, he sorted the heavy boots into the summer category because, I think, it's very muddy here all summer so you need to wear waterproof shoes. Finally, the baseball glove and bat were put in the winter category because you might use them in the school gym during the winter but there's absolutely no place to play "our national pastime" in The Village. I think I have to hide the culturally insensitive games.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Success

Recently I proctored the High School Grade Qualifying Exam. Just two students took the test- one of whom is on my caseload. It was brutally boring for me and not much fun for the students. I just sat at my desk trying to be productive (and checking in on the baseball playoffs) while they worked for about 3 hours per day. The test is un-timed so they just kept working until they finished. Students have to pass all three sections of the test (reading, writing and math) in order to get a high school diploma which means they have to keep taking it every year from 10th grade on until they pass. However, if you pass the reading section but fail the other two, you never have to take the reading section again. It's pretty high stakes.
The student on my caseload who took the test is pretty intellectually impaired. Also, his English is not nearly as strong as his Yup'ik. There's almost no chance he will pass the test this year. He turns 20 in December so he really only has one more chance to take and pass the test after this. More than likely he will finish high school with a certificate of attendance rather than a diploma. His plan is to join the Alaska Job Corp in Anchorage and then possibly the military. These are not bad options for a person in his situation. Just the fact that he's thinking about the future is a great sign actually. But chances are he's not going to go on to college and his job prospects are pretty narrow.
What is perhaps most interesting is that he can probably live a healthy and productive life with no further education or training as long as he stays in the village. He can fish and hunt just fine so subsistence is not really an issue for him and subsistence was (and still is to some extent) the name of the game here. So, while a student like this (with extremely low academic achievement) would be more or less doomed in NYC or Portland- this student will more than likely be OK out here. It would be great if he joins the Job Corp in order to open up some doors for himself but if he doesn't he could live in a way that would be very similar to his ancestors. This is, in fact, preferable to a lot of the students who want to hunt and fish rather than work some job.
On the one hand, it would be unfortunate if this student had no other options than staying here. On the other, it can be a good life. While my job is to help open doors for students, it's not my place to tell them which one to go through.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Yup'ik Dance and Song

We haven't been able to upload our little video of Yup'ik dance. So you can check some out here. If you google "yupik dance" you'll find more videos. Most of them are on YouTube of course and since our only Internet connection is through the school, I can't check out or recommend any of them because YouTube is blocked by the school's filter.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Yup'ik to English

Here are some of the phonetic differences between Yup'ik and English.

Letter in Yup’ik

English sound

C

CH

T

D

P

B

V

F

II

LONG E

 

 

R

 

 

H

(sorta – it’s like a really guttural R)

Q

K

 

G

 

G

(but way, way in the back of your throat)

UA

O (as in dog)

LL

TH

(sort of – it’s really more like you put your tongue to the roof of your mouth and hiss.)


Also, there is no B, D, F, H, J, O, X, or Z in Yup’ik.

This is only my very primitive understanding of Yup’ik phonemes. Corrections are welcome, if anyone reading this has a better knowledge of the language.


Anyway, perhaps this is why my kids have a hard time reading and writing in English? When you consider how many contradictions there are between the two systems, I think it's kind of amazing that they figure it out at all. I doubt if I could.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Fall

I miss autumn. What I always love about fall is how it makes you feel sort of sad and nostalgic for no reason. Or maybe it’s that the reason is too big – death, change, endings – to really be contained, and so it feels, in small moments, like no reason. Anyway, what’s sort of funny is that this year I find that I’m nostalgic for my yearly dose of autumnal nostalgia. It’s true that the tundra is turning some lovely shades of yellowy-brown, and the light in the afternoons (when the sun manages to peek out briefly) is a stunningly beautiful golden pink. But trees, oh wow, I miss trees. Growing up in New England, fall is very dramatic. It starts and ends all of a sudden. One day the tree up the block is green, the next, it seems, it’s a fiery orange-yellow, and before you’ve had time to fully appreciate that, it’s bare. In Portland, things are slower, more gradual, less dramatic, but no less beautiful. It’s not only the trees, though. I miss apple picking and fireplaces and fresh, crisp air and pumpkins and hayrides.

Here’s a small poem I wrote last fall. I don’t know what this fall will inspire.



Fall

I like to sit
on things made of wood.
Stumps, benches, rails.

I like the way
nostalgia pulls you down
turns your eyes darker.

Pain divides itself
from not pain
more clearly
than at other times of year.

I do not seem to mind
aging
in the fall
when the trees
empathize.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

11 people slept in the school last night

1 - speech pathologist
1 - social worker
1 - mentor for new teachers
8 - workers from out of town (some to work on the foundation of the school, some to begin improving the airstrip)

They sleep in classrooms on mattresses the school owns. The workers, and all other non-education-related folks, pay $50/night. There's a few showers in the school, a small refrigerator and coffee in the morning. Nice digs, right?

Sunday, September 27, 2009

A Walk South

Last weekend, we walked south. Here are the photos. This weekend it snowed.

Friday, September 25, 2009

It snowed

This morning OFL brought me outside to point out the snow that had fallen overnight on the hills surrounding The Village. No kidding. These are the same hills that S, E and I hiked up to on Saturday when we stretched out in the sun and watched the ocean. Now there's snow up there. It is possible that the adventure is just now beginning.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

A day in the life, S's version

My day is the same as B's in lots of ways, but here's where our paths diverge:

From 8:45-10:45 I'm in my classroom, teaching reading and writing to 8 students, ages 8 to almost 13. They're all in phases 7 and 8 for these subjects, which are third grade phases. They are frustrating at times, just like all kids, but (like all kids) generally delightful. I really enjoy them. We sing every day, and they teach me Yup'ik words which I usually mangle, and they work really hard. But the language barrier is a real challenge, and I'm learning a lot about teaching kids who are English language learners, and also just about being patient. The most frustrating thing is when I do a mini-lesson (for example, maybe I do a little lesson on how to write an outline), and I show an example, and then I ask them to try it out, and maybe I hand out a graphic organizer or a worksheet or books or sticky notes or whatever, and they just stare at me blankly. Absolutely no idea what to do. Now if one kid does this, it's usually because he wasn't listening. But if all 8 kids do it, it's on me. We go back to the beginning, start again.

From 10:45 to 11:45 I go down the hall to another teacher's room for math, and she brings her class to mine. We made this switch at my request, because my math kids are bigger (11-14), working at 5th and 6th grade levels, and can't really fit into the chairs and desks in my room. Math has its ups and downs. The most difficult thing has been that even though the kids are all in the same phase, they were all over the place within that phase. Some needed to pass tests on polygons, some on decimals, some on fractions, some on probability, some on circumference. So teaching that math class is always a juggling act, and the hardest thing is when some kids are done or need help, but I'm working with a different student on something totally unrelated. I've put together a big bin of math activities that they can do when they're done or when they're waiting for me, but this has only helped a little. Still, they are making progress, and it's a good challenge for me to work with kids who are too old to be motivated by my pleasure or displeasure, like young kids are. Keeps me on my toes.

After math I eat lunch, and for the rest of the day I pull kids, usually in ones or twos, to work on math or reading skills. This has been a totally new thing for me, and in general I like it. We get some really intensive work done, and there's usually no behavior issues. But I do miss having my own class.

I also try to leave by 4:30 or 5 - lately it's been more like 5 or 5:30. But the evenings are still long - darkness falls around 9-ish. It's easy to stay up too late talking and drinking tea with E and B. But it's a nice way to end the days.

Back to Athol this weekend for a training with B, E, and another teacher. Not really looking forward to it, though it might be exciting to see cars and grocery stores again.

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Day in the Life

Monday to Thursday-

6:00 AM: Wake up, go to the "fitness club" (a room with a couple of treadmills, stationary bikes and some weights).
7:10: Back to the apartment for shower, clothes, smoothie & coffee.
7:55: Head up to school. Walk 200 feet or so, climb 45 stairs, walk another 100 feet.
8:00: Arrive at school.
8:30: Contract day officially begins.
8:45: Help out in E's first period high school math.
9:45: Help out in 2nd period writing in the transition class. (These are students who were in the Yup'ik only grades previously and are now transitioning to English education.)
10:45: Help out in H's 3-4 grade math class.
11:25: Teach my high school writing class. Up until this period I am in other people's classes helping special education students - and anyone else who needs it. During this period I'm the regular ed. writing teacher for eight high school students. This is the first time since I left NYC that I've done that. It's great.
12:20: Lunch.
1:00: Pull out services for either a 13 year student for reading service or a five year old for speech.
1:30: Speech pull out for a five year old student with severe articulation issues.
2:00: Pull out two 9 year olds (who don't know the alphabet yet) or high school students for reading services.
2:30: DEAR = Drop Everything And Read. The whole school (in theory) spends twenty minutes reading.
2:50: Paperwork (writing IEPs, grading papers, preparing materials, etc) or meet with staff about special education students.
3:40: Student dismissed. Two or three times a week I have after school meetings. Otherwise, I spend this time preparing for the next day.
4:30: The end of the contact day. I try to go home not too long after this. I'm usually out by 5.
5:30: Saxophone practice for an hour.
6:30 - 8:30: Make & eat dinner. Usually students hang outside our window asking to come in, pressing their faces against the window and yelling.
8:30: The day usually ends by hanging out with E & S drinking tea.
10:00: In bed with the hope of getting 8 hours of sleep.

Friday -
7:00: Wake up. We skip the "fitness club" on most Fridays.
The rest of the day is the same as others until...
12:30: Twice a month we have "reading buddies" (older and younger students pair up and read to each other), once a month we have "field day" in the gym and the 4th Friday of the month we have "elders" (groups of elders come to the school to speak to the students about the Yup'ik way of of life).
2:00: Dismissal.
4:00: End of contract day.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Trash on the Beach

We took a long walk heading south on the beach. Here are some pictures I took along the way.

UPDATE: I added a few more photos from that I took the next day.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Stresses

UPDATE: I don't think I mentioned it when I first wrote this post, but I got so annoyed about the whole situation that I actually emailed the state commissioner of education, who got back to me within the hour, promising to look into my situation. Two days later I got a call from some high-up muckety-muck in the state Dept of Ed, and was told that if I sent my application in again, they would issue me a two-year certificate. Woo hoo!

Warning: this is a boring post that is mostly me venting my frustration about red tape, with even more boring background info. Feel free to skip it.

When I was in high school, I talked to several of my favorite teachers about wanting to become a teacher. A few of them gave me similar advice: don’t go to college for education. The programs are a joke, you won’t enjoy it – study the topic you’re interested in, and get certified afterward.

I took their advice and got a degree in English Literature. I don’t regret earning that degree, because I loved getting it. I took classes in poetry, science fiction, Latino literature, Chaucer, short stories, post-modern fiction and lots of other fun stuff, and I loved almost all of my lit classes. But, “getting certified afterward” turned out to be a big headache.

In New York City, at the time I started teaching, there was a shortage of certified teachers. In the years leading up to my graduation from college, the city had a policy whereby a non-certified teacher could be hired if she had expertise in a certain area, and if she began to work on her certification once she started teaching. Throughout college I planned to use this route to certification. However, the New York City Teaching Fellows program took effect, as did a new mayoral administration, and this path to certification was closed. So, I worked for a year as a research assistant at City College, and applied to the NYC Teaching Fellows.

I was accepted as a Fellow and began teaching and taking classes toward my Master’s in Education. But my first year of teaching was a nightmare, and by March I was determined to get into a better school. I applied and was hired at a charter school, which was great except that it meant I could no longer be a Teaching Fellow – my new school was not considered “high needs”, rendering me ineligible. Not wanting to have to pay back the subsidies the city had provided toward my Master’s, I quietly left the Fellows program. However, by that time I had earned enough education credits to apply for NYS certification independently. My credits combined with my year of experience got me an initial teaching license.

When I moved to Oregon, I was able to use their reciprocity agreement to obtain a transitional license, and have since been taking the classes and exams I need to move up to the next step of licensure there. By December I’ll be done with my Master’s degree.

But, now I’m in Alaska. And Alaska has all kinds of ridiculous forms and requirements for state certification. So, even though I have 6 years of experience, a nearly-completed Master’s degree, and certification in two other states, I’ve been found ineligible for certification here.

And guess what I have to do to get certified here – this is the real joke – enroll in an initial teacher preparation program. The same exact program that people with absolutely no educational experience whatsoever would have to apply for, if they wanted to become teachers.

On top of this lovely little debacle, I’m also trying to figure out how to fulfill those requirements I mentioned earlier for my next Oregon license. There’s this civil rights knowledge requirement that, until this month, I would’ve been able to complete through an online class. Suddenly the requirement has changed and I now have to take a test in person. There’s some chance I could take it in Anchorage – at a cost of several hundred dollars to get there and back – if not, I’m not sure what I’ll do there.

And then there’s the matter of the district office not giving me or B full credit for our years of experience. No big deal, just a little clerical error, but it means neither one of us got the full paycheck we should’ve gotten this month.

I’m also trying to apply for graduation from my current Master’s program – so far that’s been straightforward enough but I’ll stop holding my breath on that one when I actually have the degree in hand.

And, finally, one of our four renters has informed us she’s moving out.

And to think I thought life would be simpler, less stressful, up here.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

More photos

Here are some photos of our hike to The Bay. We sent out a larger album to our email list. I think that some people on the list aren't getting emails because their spam filters are blocking them due to the large number of recipients. If you're not getting our emails and you want to be, please leave me a comment here.

I wasn't able to upload the videos of the dancing, our internet connection is just too slow right now. Sometime soon I hope.

Hike to The Bay

Last weekend B, E, G, H and I hiked 6 miles over the tundra to the nearest village, which I’ll call The Bay (it’s accurate – this village is on a large bay). The Bay was hosting their annual Blackberry Festival and though we didn’t really see too many festivities exactly, we did get to see some more Yup’ik dancing. I’m going to post some pictures of our hike as well as a couple of short video clips of the dancing very soon.

Our hike over was beautiful, it was actually a lovely day, sunny, kind of warm even – basically it felt like my conception of a fall day (minus that leafy smell and plus the smell of “tundra tea” underfoot – a piney, lemony smell). G and H were going to stay with G’s mother, who lives in The Bay, but B and E and I weren’t sure where we’d stay – maybe at the school. Anyway, as B mentioned earlier, it was suggested that we wear rubber boots, but we don’t have them, so we just both wore our hiking boots. Well, the tundra is a lot more like a marsh than you might imagine. By the time we’d walked the first two miles, all three of us had soaking wet feet and muddy pant legs. You’d take a step onto what looked like solid land and just sink down right up to your ankle, or calf. It was okay, though, because then we finally crossed “The Bridge” (some rickety sheets of metal under several inches of thick, slick mud) and began to ascend “The Mountain” (more like a big hill, but the rest of the tundra in this area is so flat that the hills around here get counted as mountains). The going was a little harder since it was uphill, but on the other hand so much more pleasant, since the ground underfoot was both solid and dry. We stopped to rest and snack a few times, then G’s mother showed up on her ATV and gave H and all our bags a ride into town. This made cresting the hill even nicer, and from there it was just a long downhill stroll into town.

The Bay is about twice as big as The Village, and feels like it. Actually after a month here, The Bay felt like a booming metropolis. It has more than one “street” (dirt road) and three stores, plus a playground at the school. We saw a bunch of kids from our Village, then went to the community center to see some Yup’ik dancing. That lasted more than two hours, and then we were able to connect with some teachers from The Bay, one of whom generously put us up for the night. We stayed up late talking with her and another out-of-town teacher who was also visiting, then woke up on the early side, ate a little breakfast, and headed back for The Village.

I’ll say here that the dancing we saw in The Bay was not nearly as nice, in my opinion, as what we saw a few weeks ago here in The Village. It could be because it wasn’t new for me, but I think it was due more to the surroundings – here the dancers had performed in the gym, with the drummers/singers behind them, and everyone just sitting on the floor around the perimeter of the gym. There, the dancers were on stage, under rather bright fluorescent lights, with the drummers in front of them, kind of blocking them (at least for someone my height). It felt less personal, less engaging. Still, I wanted you all to be able to see some of the dancing. Apparently in mid-winter our village hosts a dance festival, and there’s a big festival in Athol, so hopefully I’ll be able to post some better video then.

Anyway, our walk back to The Village was a little more adventurous, because we were without G to guide us. Getting down the mountain was easy enough, we just followed the ATV tracks, and we made it back to the bridge without too much trouble. But then we were back in the swampy, boggy tundra. With each step our feet seemed to sink further into the ground, coming up with a loud sucking sound. If we stopped to get our bearings or choose a better path, our feet would sink slowly down – several times I looked down at my feet, thinking I was on solid ground, only to find that my feet had disappeared. So eventually we were just like, ok – we’re wet. But we’re on our way home and as soon as we get there we can put on dry socks and drink hot tea, so let’s just get there. So we stopped being so careful about our path. At one point B was crossing a particularly swampy area while E and I watched to see if we should follow – suddenly B’s lower half disappeared into the tundra. While E and I tried to stop laughing (and I yelled to B to get the camera out of his pocket), he jumped/ran/struggled out of the waist-deep pool of water he’d stepped into and up onto a low ridge. His entire lower body was absolutely drenched, his jeans were dripping, and the water was cold. It was a funny sight, but I was glad we were only about a mile out from the village – it wasn’t very warm out and I know B was not very comfortable in those sopping wet boots and jeans.

By the time we arrived back at the BIA, E and I were soaked up to our knees with mud and water, and B of course was still very wet.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Our New Camera is in My Pants Pocket



And the water is waist high.

College, my job, and some thoughts on culture

When I was applying to NYU, I had a choice in housing between traditional dorms and apartment-style dorms. On my housing form, I originally checked off apartment style, imagining myself in some hip, loft-style Greenwich Village spot, but when my older sister suggested that this might make it hard to meet people, I crossed it out and checked off traditional instead.

I was placed in an apartment style dorm anyway, and my sister’s prediction turned out to be true. I didn’t really click with the other 4 girls in the apartment, and on our floor, everyone kind of kept to themselves. It wasn’t until much later, when I met B, that I realized that other people at NYU were having radically different experiences in the dorms. In B’s dorm, everyone’s doors were open, people would pop in to one another’s rooms just to say hi or hang out, and most people on the floor knew each other.

After two years at NYU, I switched to City College, which didn’t have any dorms, so I lived in apartments for the rest my time in college. And it’s one thing I’ve always been sort of sad about, that I never had that traditional college dorm experience. Which is why I find that I’m really enjoying life in the BIA (our housing unit – it used to be the school when it was administered by the Bureau of Indian Affairs). If we’re up for visitors, we keep the door open – if not, not. While our door is open, people come by to say hi, drink tea, invite us over, offer us cookies, play Wii, or anything else. At first this made me a little uncomfortable. Now, though, after a few weeks, I love it.

My job is turning out to be different from what I expected, in both good and bad ways. Even though I teach reading, writing and math in the mornings, I don’t really feel like a regular classroom teacher. I only teach the first two hours, reading and writing, in my own classroom, then I switch with another teacher for math, since I have different (bigger) kids – my tables and chairs are too small for them. Then, for the rest of the day, I’m on Special Ed duty. So, I feel more like a specialist than a classroom teacher, and I don’t love that. I don’t feel like I’m able to cultivate the same kinds of relationships as when I had the same kids all day. I find that I don’t care as much about my classroom – it doesn’t feel as important to make it cozy and homey, since no one spends that much time there. On the other hand, my days are certainly easier – I have more prep time and fewer lesson plans than the other teachers, and since I’m not a homeroom teacher, I don’t have to worry about taking attendance or handing out forms or establishing coming in or leaving routines. All the same, I think I prefer the more traditional elementary school classroom teacher job I used to have, and I miss it. But maybe it’s just that I’m transitioning – maybe by the end of the year I’ll be totally sold on doing it this way.

I also wanted to say a few things about culture, since B has been writing some interesting stuff here on the blog. He’s definitely right about how many things are unfamiliar to our kids. When we come across new words, we first have to see if the kids know that word in English, and then, if they do, do they really understand what it means. It can make reading choppy, and it’s hard for the kids to comprehend a story when you have to stop a bunch of times and explain things.

But beyond just the language barrier and the isolation, there’s such a huge cultural gap between us and the native people here. It’s something I’m actually having a hard time with, and I’m curious to see how my thoughts and feelings about it evolve over the year. My main reservation is this – when I read about what this culture used to be like, before the arrival of westerners (or outsiders or Anglos or whatever term you prefer for non-natives), and compare that to what the culture is like now, and think about what was gained and what was lost, it seems to me that the losses far, far outweigh the gains. And even though I didn’t cause that change, by being here, especially by being here as a representative of something as fundamentally western as the American public educational system, I feel like a part of it, and right now that’s not a good feeling.

B disagrees with me, and points to the many things that the people here have gained as a result of western contact – access to modern health care, electricity, plumbing (somewhat), technology like snowmachines and guns and ATVs that make hunting and gathering easier, and perhaps most significantly, access to other cultures, places, and ways of life. That last one is the only one I find truly compelling. It’s certainly the case that, prior to western contact, people would have only one choice for their lives. Now, they can choose – stay in the village and continue the (sort of) traditional way of life, or leave. And what’s interesting about that is that even kids who absolutely do not succeed in school can still have a successful life here. As long as they can hunt, and fish, and pick berries, they’ll survive. And for people whose abilities may be limited to the extent that they can’t practice those subsistence activities, the network of extended families that exists here pretty much ensures that everyone will be cared for. But, if someone wants to leave the village, they are really going to benefit from the content and the form of education provided here at the school.

Still, that being said, to me as an outsider, the losses seem tremendous. How do you sum up the loss of a way of life? Here are things that didn’t exist in the village prior to western contact: alcoholism, drug abuse, plastic, gasoline, litter, soda, Catholicism, pollution. In many villages, the traditional dances were stamped out by Catholic and other Christian missionaries, as well as the masks and traditional spiritual beliefs. In our village, dancing exists, although in a much changed form, but the masks are gone and everyone is Catholic. And in a larger sense, one of the native presenters at our inservice training talked about how, prior to western contact, there was a balance preserved among the human, natural, and spiritual elements. Western contact disrupted that balance. Maybe it sounds a little new-agey, but you can see it and feel it – at least, I think you can. Here we’ve dressed the people in our kinds of clothes (and taken away their mukluks and qaspaqs) and housed them in our pre-fab, single family houses (and taken away their qasgiqs) and for what? Have these things, on balance, improved their lives? If so, I don’t see it.

I don’t mean to sound bitter – I’m a complete outsider myself and may only be dealing with misplaced white guilt. Who knows – maybe by and large the native population prefers it this way. But the feeling I feel is not unlike what I used to feel, often, when we lived in New York. We could only ever afford marginal neighborhoods, neighborhoods that were often about to become gentrified but hadn’t quite undergone that change yet. And I always felt guilty, being one of the first white people in a neighborhood that within 5 or 10 years would probably be filled with white people and fancy restaurants and boutiques. Just by living there, I was helping to bring about that change. It feels sort of like that here, to a much greater degree.

I hope B responds with his own post, because I know he feels differently. We got into a pretty heated debate about this one night and it actually sort of started to become an argument, so we dropped it and haven’t really gone down that road again. And, as I said, I have no idea how my own thoughts will change. But so far, this is where I’m at.