Progress 09/16/23 to 09/15/24
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?
Nothing Reported
How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Marketing efforts were a large component of the in-person meeting. The DA team is committed to ensuring that results are accessible to the local communities represented by each of the five campuses. Meeting attendees discussed ways to increase accessibility, through the writing (i.e., accessible language), format (i.e., both electronic and physical), and content (i.e., sharing stories of interest to communities). These factors remain key considerations for all future marketing efforts. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?While Year 1 included a large portion of project implementation, work to understand the short- and medium-term impacts of this program will continue through the next reporting period. A summative description of Years 1-3 activities will be reported in the final report. An area the project director has highlighted for improvement in the next reporting period is dissemination of results, with a desire to more broadly share the stories of students supported by the program,and the community impacts of DA courses and events.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
The Place-Based Solutions for Alaska Native Food and Energy Sovereignty (ANS 1.0) award has completed two years (2022-2024) and delivered academic, career, and community programs through the Drumbeats Alaska (DA) Consortium. These programs have been offered to students (Alaska Native and non-Native) and community participants throughout rural Alaska. Year 1 of the program (2022-2023) focused on providingcurricula and community outreach activities, while the primary focus of Year 2 (2023-2024) was evaluation and understanding opportunities for growth. DA consortium membersattended a retrospective, in-person evaluation focused meeting on November 15-16, 2023 in Dillingham, AK to discuss the previous achievements related to the ANS project and to think critically about opportunities for growth to continue advancingfood and energy sovereignty in Alaska through the Consortium. As the Drumbeats Alaska Consortium sites are situated across the state of Alaska, time was made in the meeting to connect and share the details of each site's programming and successes. The meeting also included discussions about how marketing efforts could best represent the work being done, serving as tools for both dissemination and potential recruitment. Finally, a strategic discussion on the future direction of the project, including learning from evaluation feedback and examining ways to partner on other projects to continue supporting the goal of Alaska Native food and energy sovereignty. Being in Dillingham, AK, this meeting allowed attendees to learn about the work specific to the Bristol Bay program site with a special sharing time from a former student. Thisstudent shared his experiences in the program and discussed how participating in a sustainable energy course increased his awareness of sustainable energy efforts in the region and how he could continue to advance these goals in the region. The DA team discussed marketing, with a heavy focus on ensuring that the tone of the stories captured the strength of the communities and the community members participating in the offered ANS grant activities. The site directors (at each of the five campuses in the consortium)also wanted to ensure that any information or marketing materials produced remainaccessible by their own local communities and community members. They discussed the criticality of shared information being written with accesibility of communities in mind, and to include electronic and physical formats (as many communities in rural areas continue to depend on physical information due to internet capacity issues in rural Alaska).Another marketing component addressed was thatit could and should help with recruitment of potential future students. In pursuit of this, there was a discussion abouteach site needing to see reflected stories and information about stories from Drumbeats and ANS to increase awareness of current and past work. During a discussion aboutcurrent learnings and experiences from this project, the group reflected on where they might want to grow and continue this work. Several themes emerged, including a what a holistic sustainability modelmight look like, as well as ways to enhance and grow existing frameworksin the local communities (i.e., of the five campuses) into the program. To continue advancing, the program needs to understand and serve the community needs, and that is how site directors see food and energy sovereignty efforts continuing to grow and expand. Ultimately this reflective discussion led to the group decision to cross collaborate across each of the five sites to create an Indigenous Energy and Food Sovereignty Scholars program (ANS 3.0). This project idea was submitted for funding and was awarded in 2024.
Publications
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Progress 09/16/22 to 09/15/23
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?IAC - TGS The IAC Drumbeats faculty Carrie Stevens attended the Tamamta Racial Equity Dialogue on Dec 12-14th at the Interior Alaska Campus. The dialogue was sponsored by the First Alaskans Institute and the Tamamta project, to facilitate support for Indigenous students in fisheries. Carrie Stevens also attended the Indigenous Ways of Knowing and Western Science Workshop on May 10th and 11th at UAF. The training was sponsored by Sarah Trainor, CNSM/IARC Faculty with Moving Forward Together Project. Facilitators were Libby Roderick and Larry Merculief. BBC - SEI Instructor Chandler Kemp attended and presented at the Sustainable Energy Conference; the Western Alaska Interdisciplinary Science Conference; the Alaska Forum on the Environment; and the United Tribes of Bristol Bay Sustainability Summit. He also participated in an Implicit Bias training provided by UAF. Instructor Laura Zimin shadowed the IAC instructor of TG F205 Managing Tribal Governments II in preparation for her to teach BBC's three Tribal Governance courses for the Spring 2024. Laura also attended the First Alaskans Institute Elders and Youth Conference, Alaska Federation of Natives Conference, and Bristol Bay Native Corporations Leadership Conference. KuC - EBOT Current advanced EBOT student originally from Kodiak Island (Sugpiag) co-taught her first Ethnobotany class, EBOT 100 Introduction to Ethnobotany this summer. More instructors are needed with the growth of the program, so one focus is on providing the necessary training and preparation to Indigenous (soon-to-be) graduates. An advanced EBOT student from Juneau, co-presented with established and well-known Alaska Native herbalist Meda DeWitt at a webinar "Roots of Indigenous Gardening". The student presented one of his projects from the course EBOT 250/1 Applied Ethnobotany. CC - FSS The FSS coordinator Annabelle Alvite attended the following classes offered by UAF Cooperative Extension Service on Zoom: Freeze Drying Basics, and Gardening and Food Security. Three residents (two families) in Selawik attended a Four Day Farming Intensive (training) at Calypso Farm and Ecology Center near Fairbanks. The coordinator offered follow-up support to the residents when they were ready to start growing or prepping their gardens for next year. NWC - HLRM HLRM faculty Dr. Jackie Hrabok participated as an intern in the 2022-23 Western Extension Director's Association (WEDA). The WEDA's mission is to support and advance its members' Cooperative Extension organizations by assisting their institutional representatives, and in turn providing value to these institutions, and the people, places, and communities they serve, in meeting the challenges and opportunities of the future. WEDA's work is accomplished through strategic collaborations, initiatives, prioritization, and actions. https://weda.extension.org/committees/weld/weld-interns-2/2022-2023-weld-interns/ Bonnie Scheele, HLRM Program Manager gave an oral presentation during Strait Science in Nome. Her role was to educate the Bering Strait region on the current trends in reindeer husbandry on the Seward Peninsula. Strait Science lectures are sponsored by UAF Northwest Campus and Sea Grant Alaska to promote understanding between citizens of the Bering Strait region and researchers who frequent the Seward Peninsula. HLRM staff, faculty, and one student participated in a cultural exchange study trip to northern Finland Nov/Dec 2022. The study group listened to and presented a lecture to Sami Reindeer herding youth at the Sami Education Institute. The group visited the Pokka Commercial Reindeer Meat Factory in Rovaniemi and the Pokka industrial reindeer leather and hide tannery. The group participated in hands-on reindeer roundup with 2000 reindeer being dewormed and marked for slaughter. The group also had meetings with the Finnish Reindeer Herders Association and discussed government support of being a herder and student studying reindeer husbandry. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The Consortium project manager updates Drumbeats Alaska social media pages on Facebook and Instragram, as well as maintaining a Drumbeats website at uaf.edu/drumbeats. IAC - TGS IAC staff generally share project outcomes through educational discussions and presentations, held at summits and working group meetings, related to food sovereignty and regulatory issues - both state-wide and Interior Alaska-focused. In this reporting period, the Tribal Governance program hosted a reception for the Protecting Our Ways of Life summit in September of 2022 in Fairbanks at the Morris Thompson Cultural and Visitor Center. Topics related to Tribal Governance were included in the programming and helped draw attention to the TG program at IAC. Instructor Carrie Stevens lead a lunch and learn with all Alaska-based employees of the US Forest Service on the topic of Tribal Co-Stewardship and Self-Governance. Another presentation that highlighted the program included Our Voice. Our Ways of Life. Our Wellness at the Native American Fish and Wildlife Society National Annual Meeting. This oral presentation consisted of a panel of Tribal Stewardship and Wellness Advocates sharing key learning and methods from their direct advocacy in numerous inter-governmental fish, wildlife, and ecosystem decision-making forums. Presenters shared their experience actively centering, sharing, and documenting their traditional ways of life, of being, and of knowing to positively impact long-term stewardship of fish, wildlife, and ecosystems of special geographic, historic, and cultural significance to their Tribal Governments. Panelists centered their unified strategy for the protection and advancement of Tribal hunting, fishing, and gathering practices to provide for the wellbeing and food security of their people, by their ongoing participation in the Board of Game, Board of Fish, Federal Subsistence Board, North Pacific Fisheries Management Council, and associated committees and councils. Panelists included: • Ben Stevens, Stevens Village, Koyukon Athabascan, Tribal Natural Resources Stewardship, Tanana Chiefs Conference • Charlie Wright, Rampart, Koyukon Athabascan, Secretary, Executive Council, Tanana Chiefs Conference • Alex Hanna, Minto, Koyukon Athabscan, Chair, Emerging Leaders, Tanana Chiefs Conference • Tommy Kriska, Nulato/Koyukuk, Koyukon Athabascan, Tribal Advocate • Carrie Stevens, Tribal Governance Faculty, University of Alaska Fairbanks Dissemination of project results is done through attending partner and food-based meetings and summits. Process-wise, IAC staff have found that strong efforts occur by being physically present and building relationships one-on-one, typically through conferences and summits. In addition, IAC staff and students attend related regulatory meetings and get to know the key players in each of the related organizations, which helps for student recruitment and community engagement and information on Project Drumbeats for Interior Alaska communities. Lastly, articles about the project are often shared with the region's tribes, through regional project partner, Tanana Chiefs Conference, newsletter The Council[i]. [i] https://www.tananachiefs.org/the-council/ BBC - SEI One of the SEI instructors presented results of solar classes and installations supported by USDA at the May board meeting of the Nushagak Electric & Telephone Cooperative, a local program partner. In addition, class and training opportunities are presented at the Nushagak Electric & Telephone Cooperative's annual membership meeting. Upcoming BBC courses for the spring semester were presented at the state-wide Alaska Forum on the Environment and Alaska Tribal Resilience Learning Network, as well as the regional United Tribes of Bristol Bay Sustainability Summit. Additional community dissemination of the SEI program occured through student presenters at the Western Alaska Interdisciplinary Science Conference. Most of the community dissemination opportunities are advertised in the Alaska Center for Energy and Power newsletter and the Alaska Tribal Resilience Learning Network email listserv. Coursework and learning opportunities are also advertised through the campus Facebook page, mass mailers, and personal outreach by campus staff and instructors. CC - FSS Project information and progress updates were shared with community gardeners, the garden community at large, and Chukchi Campus staff via emails, texts, flyers, social media (Facebook), group chats and face-to-face meetings. Community awareness has grown through local opportunities, such as the Community Trade Market and Garden Tours, which has raised awareness of the Chukchi FSS project and helped sign up new people for the FSS listserv, which includes community garden workshops and trainings. The coordinator joined other Chukchi Campus staff in a visit with the village community of Selawik, which has the largest population in the region after Kotzebue. Staff did educational and informational outreach, learning about student interest in gardening and food projects in Selawik, as well as how Chukchi could offer support to community efforts through the FSS project. Several residents were very interested in growing food and the coordinator assisted two families in starting to grow vegetables during that visit, providing gardening gloves and a trowel to one family who already had their soil ready to plant, providing a grow bag and seeds to the other family, and technical assistance to both. KuC - EBOT EBOT maintains an easily searchable program website and published the initial version of Project Jukebox Ethnobotany, Ethnoherbalism and Traditional Ways of Healing- an oral knowledge collection dedicated to documenting plant knowledge. The students of the field section of EBOT 100 Introduction to Ethnobotany present their hands-on and research project to their host community, Bethel. Since holding these student presentations for the last five consecutive years (one year virtual during Covid), EBOT has grown in popularity in Bethel. There were 40 community members who joined the final presentations. Several efforts have increased community outreach: 1. Building and maintaining personal relations (to community members, co-instructing Elders, current and former students, the wider Native and non-Native communities of people working with plants in Alaska; 2. The EBOT website; 3. Discord to provide for a forum for former and current EBOT students; and 4. Public events. NWC - HLRM NWC and HLRM program staff and faculty maintain Facebook and Instagram accounts. Facebook private HLRM group and public postings are the most efficient way in sharing news about experiences related to reindeer husbandry in meat production, culture, crafts, tourism, climate, etc. Emails from NWC list-server and printed fliers advertise of upcoming HLRM courses or community visits or public talks. Phone calls and text messages are sent by HLRM faculty and staff to known colleagues in Savoonga, Stebbins, and Mekoryuk. Nunivak Island Mekoryuk Reindeer Association and HLRM staff and faculty began a new partnership in November 2022. The CEO and manager of the slaughterhouse has requested consulting multiple times during FY 2022-23 about range management, herd health, and meat production options. The knowledge learned during this trip will be shared with the Savoonga Commercial Reindeer Company to help them develop their newly planned corral, fencing, and commercial production of reindeer meat in a new slaughterhouse. Since the April 2023 Mekoryuk field study trip and the November 2022 Sami Finland cultural exchange in reindeer husbandry, HLRM staff and faculty have incorporated photos and videos taken from those two trips into lecture materials for all 9 credits of HLRM classes taught in May, June, and July 2023. 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. Special projects beyond the original scope of ANS will be implemented using additional funding. The evaluation of special project activities will include site observations, where and when feasible, and data collection will occur from project activity instructors and participants.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
In December 2022, Project Directors of each Consortium site engaged in a 2 day-long Project Director's meeting to discuss findings and implications for future directions of the project based on evaluation findings. Project directors met and discussed the findings of the project evaluation. Project directors also met to discuss data collection methodology as well as identify Impact Stories for impact storytelling. Project directors reviewed and utilized data findings to set the direction for future strategic actions and priorities. Drumbeats programs continue to collaborate across partner campuses to deliver place-based curricula in FANH sciences with joint course development through BBC and KuC related to Alaska Gardens: The KuC webinar "Roots of Indigenous Gardening" and ENVI 150 Alaska Wild Gardens II course provide an ecological approach to understanding important plants to the people of Bristol Bay and Kuskokwim regions (Southwest Alaska). BBC's collaboration with IAC / Tribal Governance and Stewardship included Sustainable Salmon and Tribal Entrepreneurship & Sustainable Resources curricula. Both courses focus on the relationship with people and natural resources including salmon, to the well-being of Tribal Communities. Faculty incorporated Indigenous and Western science methods of utilizing natural resources to develop and market traditional arts. Emphasis was placed on marketing opportunities provided by tribal organizations, Indigenous arts ecology, and sustainable economic development in Tribal communities. IAC - TGS IAC Tribal Governance and Stewardship program further increased student enrollment and public participation through strategic partnerships, such as with the Yukon River Drainage Fisheries Association and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, creating a greater understanding in a broader community of Alaska Native food security and sovereignty as it relates to wild food resources. Through these strategic partnerships, TG courses and seminars were inclusive of both non-Native resource managers and Native wild food harvesters, providing information that students and participants were able to apply directly in the field of fisheries and wildlife regulatory management in Alaska. The TG 222 Course: Tribal Participation in State Fish and Game Management Systems had 29 students participating this year. Through the course, students learned about the regulation of fisheries, and how to participate in the board of fish process so that they can learn how to change regulations to better their communities. The focus in our content has increased interest in the TG program and increased students' motivation to continue learning governance and regulation rules. Grant funds were used to teach Sem TG 692: Indigenous Fisheries Governance for 10 graduate students in the Tamamta program. The course is important for students who will enter tribal governance with knowledge about stewardship of food resources. This allows students to learn how to navigate the governance and regulatory agencies and policies that directly influence these fields connected to food sovereignty. The expansion and increased presence of the TG program in the graduate degree area is important because the curriculum is unique and is not a topic provided to demonstrate Alaska Native voice in governed food systems, both wild and cultivated (Obj. #1). Many of the programs that examine this topic, for instance in the University's Fisheries Department, are very academic in their approach and miss the human and community impact that the field has and continues to have on Alaska Native access to food and food regulation and sovereignty. BBC - SEI Students completing the solar train-the-trainer class have taken jobs in the solar industry, and one is already in the process of becoming an adjunct professor for a future solar installation class. One student in the Western Alaska Interdisciplinary Science Conference class was awarded the Todd Radenbaugh People's Choice Award for his presentation on a conceptual wind energy array. Five students in Your School's Energy Future further invested in their education by traveling to Anchorage for the Introduction to Home Energy Assessment class. Students in the Home Energy Assessment class went on to conduct an energy assessment in their home community. One student in the Alaska Utility Lecture Series went on to take an internship with the Alaska Center for Energy and Power. At least one student in Basics of Heat Pump Systems went on to install a heat pump in their own home. Another of the students directs a nonprofit called Alaska Heat Smart that facilitates heat pump installations in Alaska. KuC - EBOT After taking EBOT courses or graduating with one of EBOT's academic milestones, students become involved in initiatives or take positions related to food security and sovereignty. One graduate of the program became the events coordinator for the Nov 2023 Alaska Farm and Food Festival. Another graduate accepted a position for a homeschooling program where she will be responsible for creating ethnobotany-related curriculum. A current student from Kodiak Island works for the Kodiak Area Native Association and uses the knowledge gained in EBOT classes to apply for grants related to food security. Another group of graduates is actively engaged in the Kayaani Sisters Council, who published the first ever Responsible Harvesting Guidelines "to help educate and inform those who want to learn about Indigenous cultures and want to gather local plants."[i] The group is led by a Lingít EBOT graduate.[ii]. CC - FSS The FSS grant project coordinator (Annabelle Alvite) offered a 4-wk Arctic Gardening (AG) 101 lecture class on fundamentals of Arctic gardening in Kotzebue with a complementary 6-wk AG102 hands-on outdoor class that included garden workshops open to the community. To increase knowledge of and access to wild food plants, Chukchi Campus (CC) hosted a Native plant identification class offered by a community volunteer knowledgeable in wild plants. Student participants were able to tour the Chukchi gardens and had several field trips on the tundra and beach.The FSS project increased the food garden capacity by 50%. Due to the increased number of community gardeners and garden volunteers who helped construct four new garden boxes, CC now has 12 food garden boxes and two wild food garden boxes. More community members participated in the program or were hired through the garden, including a teen who took a part-time garden assistant position for the summer. NWC - HLRM Stebbins and St. Michael students participated in face-to-face HLRM classes in late summer 2022, fall 2022, and spring 2023. One student was hired as the Manager of the Stebbins Reindeer Herd and began actively advertising meat sales on social media. Three students from Nome are children of the Midnite Sun Reindeer Ranch. These three students are learning to run the Davis Herd and have relocated from Anchorage to Nome to learn how to run the family business and to develop their identity as local reindeer herders. Cultural relevance is the backbone of education for HLRM programming to serve the needs of Indigenous students. Additionally, HLRM now has a full-time assistant professor and year-round HLRM program manager. The creation of these two positions for FY 2022-23 has made a substantial impact on student recruitment and workshops/classes held. It gives the HLRM program a voice to the world in education but also in supporting Alaska Native students in obtaining their dreams of higher education and contributing to their communities. [i] https://alaskaethnobotany.community.uaf.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/761/2022/06/2022-REVISED-Printer-Version-FinalRespectful-Harvesting-Guidelines-red-size.pdf [ii] https://kaasei.com/
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Brewer, J. P., Black, J., Stevens, C., & Ancestors, G. (2023). Toward Alaska Native research and data sovereignty: Observations and experiences from the Yukon Flats. Environment and Planning F, 2(12), 247263. https://doi.org/10.1177/26349825231163146
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