Progress 09/01/23 to 08/31/24

Outputs
Target Audience:The project audience includes Alaska Native peoples and residents throughout Alaska. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Interior Alaska Campus - TGS: Carrie Stevens attended the Tamamta Racial Equity Dialogue in December 2023 at the College of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences in Juneau. At this dialogue, Carrie served as a supporting host. The dialogue was sponsored by the First Alaskans Institute and the Tamamta project, with a goal of facilitating support for Indigenous students in fisheries. Carrie also attended an ISM Writing Retreat in Fall 2023 with the Indigenizing Salmon Management working group at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis. This retreat was used to develop related publications. Finally, in March 2024, Carrie attended the Federal Subsistence All-Council meeting, to stay up-to-date on current issues affecting Federal Subsistence Management. Bristol Bay Campus - SEI: Chandler Kemp attended the Alaska Forum on the Environment conference in February 2024, the Alaska Mariculture Conference in February 2024, and the Western Alaska Interdisciplinary Science Conference (WAISC) in April 2024. Chandler was also able to participate in emergency first aid training. Laura Zimin took Alutiiq Language I and Alutiiq Language II (each course was four credits). These classes helped support the language portion of the TGF160 Indigenous Culture and Science Camps. Laura also participated in the Bristol Bay Leadership Forum in fall 2023 and in the Indigenous Language Summit in spring 2024. Kuskokwim Campus - EBOT: The professional development activities at KuC focused on student professional development. Most of the students in the program are enrolled in the EBOT Occupational Endorsement Certificate (OEC). KuC had nine students graduate from the program in 2024. Project staff at KuC have also prioritized taking students to conferences so that they can learn how to prepare and share their work while building professional relationships with people in related fields. Additionally, Tia Holley was added as a co-instructor to the EBOT 100 field course to provide mentoring so that she could be a future instructor. Chukchi Campus - FSS: In June 2024, Annabelle Alvite participated in a rural farm training at the Calypso Farm and Ecology Center to learn about what other rural residents are growing and share information about what they are growing in Kotzebue. A major highlight from this training was learning how to preserve flowers for future pollination when male flowers weren't ready and female flowers were. This opportunity also provided information on composting and the role it plays in avoiding many plant and soil issues. On the return trip, Annabelle visited an urban fruit orchard in Anchorage, where she learned about propagating fruit trees and varieties that may work in the arctic. In July 2024, Annabelle participated in the field class portion of the Ethnobotany 101 class at KuC, where she learned techniques to improve native and tundra plant workshops. In August, Annabelle returned to the Calypso Farm and Ecology Center to participate in a native plant class, for food and medicinal purposes. Annabelle will be using this knowledge to provide more informative workshops on native plants and cultivating native food plants in the home garden at CC. On the return from this visit, she met with the UAF Botanical Garden founder and creator of the Childrens' Garden in Fairbanks. They discussed ways to continue enhancing the CC gardens and engage the community, including learning how to propagate fruit bushes in Kotzebue, varieties that might work for the Kotzebue and arctic regions, and developing a children's garden. Northwest Campus - HLRM Progam Manager Bonnie Scheele attended the Alaska Food and Farm Festival (Better Together: Celebrating our Abundance and Diversity) in November 2023. In the same month, Bonnie also attended the Bureau of Indian Assistance (BIA) Tribal Providers Conference as well as the Kawerak Reindeer Herders Association Annual Meeting in Nome. In December, Bonnie Scheele introduced HLRM to Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian staff and director, then attended the Intertribal Agriculture Council Annual Convention. In 2024, Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok and Bonnie Scheele attended the Alaska Reindeer Council Annual General Meeting in Nome (February), where they also presented about High Latitude Range Management. As the Annual WAISC meeting was located in Nome during April 2024, Dr. Hrabok was a member of the steering, planning, and organizing committee. Dr. Hrabok was also the session chair for two days of the conference. Finally, in June 2024, Bonnie Scheele attended and served as a committee member at the Kawerak Reindeer Herders Program Advisory Committee Meeting and both attended the Intertribal Agriculture Council Youth Summit in Fairbanks How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Drumbeats Alaska Consortium: The Consortium project manager updates Drumbeats Alaska social media pages on Facebook and maintains a Drumbeats website at uaf.edu/drumbeats. Interior Alaska Campus - TGS: All outreach at IAC is done through existing partnerships and networks, many of which are long-standing relationships. Dissemination of project results is often done by working directly with tribal partners. IAC has worked specifically with the Tanana Chiefs Conference, the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, and the Ahtna Inter-Tribal Resources Commission. In addition to tribal partners, IAC has also worked directly with federal partners, including the Office of Subsistence Management and North Pacific Fisheries Management Council staff. The Tribal Governance program at IAC has also maintained relationships with the Protecting Our Ways of Life working group and with Native Peoples Action. Bristol Bay Campus - SEI: Outreach at BBC was done through building/maintaining relationships, presentations, and multiple media channels. Building relationships with local organizations (e.g., United Tribes of Bristol Bay, Alaska Power Association, Renewable Energy Alaska Project, Teaching Through Technology, and Bristol Bay Regional Career and Technical Education Program) helped to increase student enrollment in the courses. Additionally, outreach was done through partnerships with the Smithsonian Arctic Research Center, Bristol Bay Native Corporation, Bristol Bay Regional Career and Education Center, Bristol Bayn Native Association, the United Tribes of Bristol Bay, and the Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation. A workshop was held with participants through a partnership with the Smithsonian, and an additional workshop is coming up in Fall 2024. BBC continues to do outreach for classes and presentations on social media and has made announcements on the local radio station (KDLG) in Dillingham. Chandler Kemp presented at community sustainable energy meetings that were organized by the United Tribes of Bristol Bay in Dillingham, Aleknagik, Ekwok, New Stuyahok, and Koliganek. He also provided presentations on alternative energy systems for fishing boats at the Alaska Forum on the Environment, green energy in mariculture at the Alaska Mariculture Conference, and solar installation training at WAISC. Chandler also presented to the Nushagak Electric Board about solar power potential in Dillingham. Laura Zimin presented on Worldviews and Leadership at the Dillingham Ciulistet Retreat. She also presented on project planning at the King Salmon Ciulistet Retreat and served as a panelist on the Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Advisory event. In addition to her presentations, Laura served as a judge for the Bristol Bay Business Marketplace Competition. Kuskokwim Campus - EBOT: One central piece of outreach done by staff at KuC is through maintenance of an easily searchable program website as well as the Project Jukebox Ethnobotany website. Project Jukebox is dedicated to Ethnobotany, Ethnoherbalism, and Traditional Ways of Healing, and is an oral knowledge collection that documents plant knowledge. Additional outreach is done through presentations at conferences such as the Farm and Food Festival, and through the students, who reside in the communities of interest, and are often active on social media. Dissemination also occurs through public events, such as the EBOT 100 final presentations and participating at the North Currant Day, an event organized by the UAF Botanical Garden. Chukchi Campus - FSS: The primary method of dissemination for CC is through email and word-of-mouth. Frequent emails are sent that include the Chukchi garden progress, compost progress, as well as advertise events and open garden hours. These advertising/update emails are typically sent at least every other week but happen much more frequently at the beginning and end of the growing season. Additional education emails are sent with information about garden maintenance, such as thinning, weeding, identifying plants, watering, and cold frame management. These emails are sent at the same frequency as the advertising and update emails. Information is also sent through group text messages, which include invitations as well as education/mentoring information. As needed one-on-one meetings with gardeners or students who can't make scheduled activities are held almost every Saturday. Further dissemination occurs through events, such as the wildflower caravan tour in June and the garden tour in July. Information is shared with kids from the Boys and Girls Club every Thursday, who attend the open garden hours. Final outreach methods have included UAF cooperative extension gardening webinars, and occasional social media posts. Northwest Campus - HLRM: Dissemination from NWC has been multifaceted. Dissemination occured through traditional media, social media, presentations, as well as traveling and recruitment. For traditional media, Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok and Bonnie Scheele participated in the Sun and Soil podcast, for episode three of their six-part "Feeding the Last Frontier" series. The episode was titled "A Reindeer Called Rhonda" and was released in November 2023. Social media outreach has occurred on Facebook, where photo summaries were posted after every class or trip taken. These photo summaries highlight the higher education opportunities available from the UAF NWC HLRM program, effectively recruiting potential students from the circumpolar reindeer husbandry community. Additionally, there is private HLRM Facebook group that allows past and current students to share information with each other about different things happening with reindeer enterprise, Indigenous meat production, rural community grant opportunities and more. Additional outreach has been through opportunities to present at the annual Kawerak Reindeer Herders Association meeting, which was attended by the Indigenous reindeer herders of Alaska. The HLRM faculty and staff updated attendees about the HLRM outreach and offered new communities the opportunity to visit the NWC and HLRM programs. Finally, a large amount of outreach is done through traveling and word-of-mouth. In April 2024, the Kawerak Reindeer Herders Association flew in their 16 community members to tour the Northwest Campus and meet the current HLRM students. The program manager (Bonnie Scheele) has attended government agency conferences and meetings in Washington, D.C. with Senators and House Representatives to promote food sovereignty. Bonnie has also networked with the Alaska Federation of Natives, Intertribal Agriculture Council, and the University of the Arctic Board of Directors. After the 2023 trip to Sápmi, Finland, Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok shared news about the global exchange through emails, meetings, and conferences. These outreach efforts spurred directors to apply for USDA and EPA grants to help Alaskan rural communities. Also due to this word-of-mouth, Unangan and Cup'ik reindeer owners have reached out to the HLRM program and requested guidance in creating high school reindeer husbandry curricula for their communities What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?The primary activity in ANS project year 2 is program evaluation in coordination with the project manager on monitoring activities and UAF PAIR on data collection, review, and synthesis. Ongoing meetings will be held by the evaluation team with each of the five campus' faculty and site directors and staff throughout Year 2. Interviews will also take place with ANS faculty and administrative staff for each campus to reflectively collect data specific to challenges and accomplishments of project objectives and lessons learned on collaborations and partnerships. Data synthesis, campus overview documents, and a summary of findings will be written up to provide a summative description of Year 1 ANS activities. While most project goals were achieved in year 1, the project staff across all campuses are consistently looking to identify ways that will continue to grow the program and contribute to success. For the next reporting period, IAC plans to continue implementing a tribal stewardship occupational endorsement. In doing so, they hope to encourage more students to seek degrees, endorsements, or certificates. Although classes at IAC are highly attended, many students are currently not seeking any type of degree or endorsement. BBC plans to roll out a campus credential in Cultural Knowledge of the Bristol Bay Region. This credential will provide the base courses for the proposed Occupational Endorsement in Tribal Stewardship. KuC exceeded their goals on curriculum development and course offerings but wants to continue improving dual enrollment. This remains high on the agenda for future reporting periods, and project staff have already established a course that will be offered in Fall 2024 at a high school near Fairbanks. CC is planning for more outreach and engagement with the local schools, foster homes, church food banks, and other health organizations (e.g., diabetes prevention and behavioral health). There is a desire to bring in more involvement from the Community Advisory Council to better understand the community's needs and how they can be supported. They are also looking to create more opportunities for participant feedback that can be utilized to continue enhancing the program. At NWC, faculty and staff plan to continue updating the curriculum to be adaptive to student needs. In addition to supporting student needs, curriculum updates will also allow for the program to include the most recent and up-to-date information on reindeer husbandry. Faculty and staff also plan to augment Indigenous reindeer herder student persistence and continue educating the public on Indigenous reindeer husbandry

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Drumbeats Alaska Consortium: A large success of the Drumbeats project is the number of student and community member participants engaged with Drumbeats courses and activities. Quantitative datasets for student and participant outcomes (from the UAF Office of Institutional Research Analysis and Planning) include aggregated data on student enrollment in programs and courses by the Consortium. The ANS dataset for fall semester 2023, spring 2024, and summer 2024 showed 497 unduplicated students (703 duplicated students) took Drumbeats sponsored courses in Year 1. Out of 497 unduplicated students, 53.12% were reported as Alaska Native.However, these data do not capture student and community member participation in workshops and other events that were not assigned a course reference number (CRN). Thus, the number of students participating is higher than these data indicate. Interior Alaska Campus (IAC) - TGS: IAC provided more than $57,000 in direct scholarships to students for curriculum related to Alaska Native food and energy sovereignty, and more than 120 individual course scholarships. IAC also provided two webinars to the larger UAF community as part of the Place for Knowledge Exchange. The webinars focused on tribal food security and co-stewardship to inform viewers about Tribal perspectives and issues. IAC designed and implemented a tribal natural resources stewardship and wild food academic curriculum. This curriculum included five unique intensive opportunities, designed in collaboration with the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council, the Alaska Board of Game, and the Alaska Local Fish and Game Advisory Committees. The curriculum also included three semester-long courses. Combined, these opportunities gave 127 students the opportunity to participate and learn more about wild food resources. IAC delivered the Co-Stewardship Symposium in conjunction with federal employees and decision makers related to wild food stewardship and management. This symposium provided 39 students with direct access to federal agency staff. Bristol Bay Campus (BBC) - SEI: Twelve students completed a solar installation "train the trainer" program. Then in spring 2024, two of those students went on to teach a solar installation class in Kotzebue and seven students co-taught an off-grid solar class. There are two new solar installation classes under development for fall 2024, both of which will be taught by this cohort of students. Place-based learning opportunities were created, including a home energy basics and solar class, a half-day introduction to solar energy activity, a home energy basics curriculum at the Rural Alaska Community Environmental Job Training program, and Indigenous culture and science camps that explored food sovereignty in relation to environmental sustainability. Students from the Bristol Bay region were able to travel to Juneau and meet with legislators, learning about the legislative process. Two opportunities were provided for high school students to engage with solar technologies and energy efficiency technologies. Students went on to conduct weatherization in their own homes. Finally, a student in the TG F161 Tribal and Community Leadership Development course gave a presentation at the Bristol Bay Leadership Forum, highlighting the student view of the Bristol Bay Regional Career and Technical Education program, as well as its partnership with the Bristol Bay campus. Kuskokwim Campus (KuC) - EBOT: Ethnobotany courses have become a central part of the mission identified by the UAF College of Indigenous Studies. In support of this, two new courses were developed and offered: EBOT 120 and EBOT 193. EBOT 120 (Intro to Edible and Medicinal Plants) was a direct response to requests received from the campus' surrounding communities . After taking the course, students shared that they felt more confident in harvesting their own plants for food and medicine. EBOT 193 (Practical Applications of Traditional Healing for Health and Wellness) was well received, with multiple course participants planning to offer similar events in their communities. Students shared that they learned about healing in a cultural and spiritual context, and that the experience was essential for cultural revitalization and provided a basis for healing and sovereignty. Students consistently share that the training in the program has prepared and encouraged them to pursue careers and personal goals in the wider field of food sovereignty and cultural revitalization as it relates to plants. Access is further supported through dual enrollment Science and Culture Camps, which have been effective at encouraging local students to attend college. Additionally, the final presentations of the EBOT 100 field course in Bethel have become an annual community event, with 53 people in attendance this year. Chukchi Campus (CC) - FSS: Students and community members were provided with open garden events twice a week for the duration of the growing season. Attendees were invited to take part in the gardening, learn about arctic gardening, and harvest fruits and vegetables to take home. Additional garden learning opportunities were available, covering the basics of arctic gardening, digging deeper into arctic gardening, weeding and thinning, and a composting workshop. A wildflower caravan tour drew approximately 17 attendees. Garden field trips have been available to local K-5 students, providing place-based learning experiences and engaging students in gardening at an early age. Covers have been added to the four additional food garden boxes that were set up in 2023. These covers turn the boxes into cold frames, making them "mini greenhouses". This year, project staff also experimented with a new design for the cold frames to have better control over the air temperature and light. This has yielded knowledge on how to manage factors such as light, warmth, wind, pollinators, pests, moisture, and more. These learnings will help to extend the growing season and increase garden efficiency and harvests. The project staff also recruited volunteers to construct the foundation for the season extending greenhouse while the ground was still soft. The foundation has been laid, and project staff will observe snow drift and wind patterns this winter. Armed with this new information, they will plan different ways to modify the landscape that will minimize negative effects on the greenhouse. The full greenhouse should be constructed in Summer 2025. Northwest Campus (NWC) - HLRM: The HLRM program at NWC has continued to provide students with the knowledge and skills to transition into leadership positions within their communities, which is demonstrated by two Stebbins/St. Michael HLRM students being hired as Reindeer Herd Managers in their respective communities. This can also be seen in multiple ways across different groups of students. For example, HLRM Occupational Endorsement students have gone on to be high school participants at the Intertribal Agriculture Council Alaska Youth Summit (Fairbanks) and have also attended the Food and Farm Festival, hosted by the Alaska Food and Policy Council in November 2023 (Anchorage). Other students have served on panels and received awards for their contributions (e.g., Elder Award for Sitnasuak). Travel is another large success at NWC, as they were able to send Alaskan Reindeer husbandry delegates on a Sápmi trip in Finland. These delegates returned and used their new skills to write EPA grants for the Reindeer Herders Association and HLRM. Finally, NWC is seeing student recruitment through positive experiences of other students. For example, one adult student recruited their high school age daughter to participate in several classes.

Publications

• Type: Peer Reviewed Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2024 Citation: Esquible, J., Hoffman, A., Lowrey, D., Ropati, D., Cleveland, J., Williams, D. M., & Carothers, C. L. (2024). Aulukluki neqkat: Centering care of salmon and relational research in Indigenous fisheries in the Kuskokwim River, Alaska. Arctic Science, 10. https://doi.org/10.1139/AS-2023-0039
• Type: Peer Reviewed Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2023 Citation: Brewer, J., & Black, J. C. (2023). Toward Alaska Native Research and Data Sovereignty: Observations and Experiences for the Yukon Flats. SAGE Journals: Environment and Planning F: Philosophy, Theory, Models, Methods and Practice, 2. https://doi.org/10.1177/26349825231163146
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2024 Citation: Worldviews & Leadership. Presented by Laura Zimin at the Dillingham Ciulistet Retreat.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2024 Citation: Project Planning. Presented by Laura Zimin at the King Salmon Ciulistet Retreat.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2023 Citation: Alaska Gardens: Growing culturally relevant Alaskan plants (Conference Presentation) Alaska Food Policy Council Farm and Food Festival, November 2023, Anchorage, Alaska Panelists: Lisa Strecker, Josh Smith, Khalil English, Jessica Newton, Tia Holley
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2023 Citation: UAF-NWC-HLRM Academic Programming and Partnership with S�mi Education Institute, Finland. Presented by Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok and Program Manager Bonnie Scheele at Kawerak Reindeer Herders Association Annual General Meeting, November 2023, Nome, Alaska.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2024 Citation: High Latitude Range Management. Presented by Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok at Alaska Reindeer Council Annual General Meeting, February 2024, Nome, Alaska.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2024 Citation: Circumpolar Reindeer Husbandry. Presented by Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok at Iditarod, March 2024, Nome, Alaska.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2024 Citation: Circumpolar Reindeer Husbandry. Presented by Dr. Jacqueline Hrabok at WAISC, April 2024, Nome, Alaska.