Sneak peak on Scammon

I thought I'd write something up about Scammon before I do a sildeshow. This way you all will have more info. about the village I live in.
Scammon Bay (Marayarmiut) is settled at the foothills of the Askinuk Mountains. The people who relocated the village moved to a higher ground because of flooding in the previous place which is about a mile east from here. The population is approximately 500 or more and still growing.
The main places that people are employed all year long are the tribal and city governements, the school, clinic, and the corporation. Seasonal jobs include firefighting, city projects, and commercial salmon fishing. Although many families earn their income through a year round or seasonal job, almost every household depend on harvesting from the land and sea. There are a few who depend on gov't assisstance, but someone from each household goes out hunting and fishing. Although the gas prices are at their highest, 4.78/gal. it doesn't stop them from going out.
The new K-12 school, which is about three years old now has about 300 students that go through the doors every week for 180 days out of the year. The staff includes 16 certified, six of whom are from Scammon and about eight classified classroom aides. The HeadStart has 17-20 children ages 3-5 enrolled (centerbased) and there are many that considered homebased (due to no space in the center, ususally younger ones). It is operated through AVCP, organization based in Bethel.
There are two main stores (all grocery) here and two smaller businesses that sell snacks, rent movies, and provide game equipment (pool tables) for anyone interested (mostly teenagers hangout there). Two churches, catholic and covenant are pastored by people who are from out of town.
The main sport that people are mostly interested here is basketball. Our Highschool boys and girls have been contenders in our district for a long period of time, going to state meets almost every year (girls), but this year they have been moved up to 2A, because of high enrollment numbers in the highschool. We will see how this year goes.
There are just a handful of elders left here in our community. And all of them speak fluent Yup'ik, while the younger people are not. So many times we have to interpret for our own people, which is very sad. The fluent speakers range in the age range of 35-40 on up. Although the school provides a bilingual program, we cannot depend on it alone to keep our language going. It is up to parents and grandparents to teach it to their kids/grandkids.
I hope you get a little idea of Scammon, but if you'd like to know something, just ask, if I know the answer I'll tell you.

confused blogger

Hello fellow students and professor,
The weeks are passing by very quickly. I forget to enter a weekly blog before or on a Sunday. I wish the computer could remind me by flashing a message before the deadline of due entries, wouldn't that be nice? I just need to keep organized, I guess (trying to do many things at once).
Moose hunting season, black and cranberry season are coming to a close, but many people are fishing for tom cods, seal hunting, and bird hunting. It is still raining and blowing but a few breaks allow people to go out and do what they need to do.
I tried uploading photos for my panraven storybook, but it took too long I canceled. Is there a faster way to upload photos? It took about 2 hrs.or more to do 5 pics at a time. (I hope I will remember the steps to complete successfully). I'll keep trying.

Subsistence and School

Subsistence is School

Our school here in Scammon excuses students and staff to go out subsistence hunting, fishing, and gathering. Although there are no number of days given that will be counted excused the homeschool coordinator says that she will push for setting a number of days this year. She mentioned 5 days as "enough", any more than that is "too much missed days." This is for the students, as for teachers they have a given number of days of leave that they've accumulated and that's what they use.

For now, our school does not have a fixed plan on make up work. It is totally between the teacher and student.(There might be one, I just briefly spoke w/homeschool coordinator about this.)

Our school does not operate around our subsistence way of life. It begins around late Aug., break for Christmas and end in early part of May.

I wish it would operated around our subsistence way of life, this would teach students and new staff where/what/how to hunt/fish/gather during a certain time of the year (season). For within our culture to subsist is to survive. Subsistence is a huge part of our culture.

Staff who take out their student to do some kind of subsistence activity incorporate certain content areas like science, math into their curriculum, but when parents pull out their child(ren) to subsist it may be something that the student and teacher work out to make up missed work.

If we teach our students to survive, we are teaching them a "real life" skill and now-a-days that's what schools are pushing for, aren't they?

Technology Trouble

Hello Friends!
It's been a while since I got on line, so many obstacles to overcome to keep in touch with all of you.You guys are important to me.
Without technology what are we to do? We (I know I have) come to depend on the internet system for everything I do. For one lllooonnnggg week I felt soo helpless without the internet services that have become an important part of everyday life. My everyday life for now are the classes I'm taking this semester, and for each one of them I have to get on line. Man, you guys dont' know how good it is to be reading your entries and "feeling" like I'm in touch again.
I don't know how long the village will be out, but I am able to use the schools computers to some work. It's kind of scary and sad to realize that I have become so depended on technology, but it is mostly good. :)