By HENRY COLT
Sentinel Staff Writer
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski was at Pacific High Wednesday afternoon, speaking with students in the custom of Pacific High.
“We have arranged for a student talking circle with you and your staff today,” Principal Mandy Summer told her, once everyone was seated. “This is one of our primary means of communication here at the school, and it fits in with our restorative practices program.”
“We’ll be using a talking piece,” she continued, “so that everyone can focus their attention on who the speaker is. Students, as you know and do so well, this is your opportunity to speak from the heart and speak your truth. Make sure you’re listening from the heart as well.”
Summer explained that the talking circle would consist of three written questions posed by students but answered by everyone in the room — ten students, two teachers, Murkowski and her aides, one Americorps volunteer, and Rachel Roy, executive director of the Chamber of Commerce and also a Pacific High graduate.
Senior Angelei Young kicked off the circle by asking everyone to give their name, school year or job description, and one thing they love about Alaska.
As a string-wrapped stick (the talking piece) made its way around the circle, students said they loved Alaska’s “people,” “snow,” “pristine beaches,” “ocean,” “islands,” “mountains,” “seasons,” “respect for the land,” “purposeful living,” “weather (well, a love and hate),” and “culture.”
When the stick reached Murkowski, the senator said, “One of the things I love most about Alaska is how the people here are grounded and rooted in the land.”
After everyone in the circle had spoken, Pacific High senior Madison Roy-Mercer swapped the old talking piece for a stuffed toy turtle and asked,“What brought you to Pacific High?”
“I transferred here quite recently from Sitka High because I didn’t really have time to do anything – I was constantly stressed out, and it took a big toll on my mental health,” said one student.
“I was also recently at Sitka High, and I came here because it was a smaller community and it seemed more supportive,” another student said.
“Here we have smaller classrooms, more one-on-one time with our teachers, and more personal relationships,” another student said.
When it was the senator’s turn with the turtle, she said, “My husband and I have two boys, and they could not be more different. One of them will read a text and be able to recite it back to you, the other one hates to read – he’s got a reading disability. But he’s a gifted artist and can do things with his hands that his older brother can’t.
“I, as a parent, realized that if we’re going to do right by our kids at this stage, we have to give them educational opportunities that are beyond just what you’re going to get at Sitka High school – and to allow the students to choose, allow the parents to choose, but make sure that we do that within a system where we don’t erode the funding for our public schools,” she said.
Murkowski said that 16 years ago she made a personal pledge to visit every elementary, middle and high school in Alaska –- a pledge she’s still working on.
The second question (“Why do you continue coming to Pacific High?”) generated overwhelmingly positive responses from the students and faculty: “It’s been an extended family to me,” “we don’t use textbooks,” “the evolving curriculum,” “student-centered” “something that saved my life,” and even the “fish tacos.”
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski gets a question from Youths for Sustainable Futures member Melissa Gibson Wednesday at Centennial Hall. Murkowski, in town all day, spoke at the Sitka Chamber of Commerce noon luncheon
and is meeting with separate groups of Sitkans, including Pacific High students, and at a community roundtable discussion this afternoon. Other Pacific High students pictured are, from left, Juel Fowler, Hedvika
Krovina and Raven Richards. A full story on the senator’s visit will appear in Thursday’s Sentinel. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)
Principal Summer showed Murkowski a plate of cilantro-garnished, kale-chip-accompanied rockfish tacos – the day’s school lunch. Summer said Pacific High students made them in a culinary class with fish provided by the Fish-to-Schools program, a partnership between the Sitka Conservation Society and local fishermen.
But on the third and final question (“What are the challenges we face as a school?”) students’ responses took on a more serious tone.
“I’d say budget cuts,” said one student. “Every year there’s the possibility of the school shutting down, and we lost our one counselor due to budget cuts.”
“I feel like now that she’s not here, there’s a little hole,” said another student, speaking of the school counselor, who was on staff last year but not this year.
“We need social workers, and we need funding,” said another student.
“Counseling support,” said Principal Summer, who added, “We’re still trying to maintain those services for our students, but it means it’s pulling Matt (teacher Matthew Groen) out of the classroom. It’s pulling me away from grants and reports and visioning – the types of things I would be doing as a school principal. It has really just spread the staff even more thin... When budget gets really tight – like really, really tight – and people are starting to pick what can go, Pacific High is usually one of the things that’s seen as a one off.”
Groen said, “It’s tough to split, or almost triage: are we going to teach this lesson, or, this person has experienced this last night or doesn’t have a home to go to. So what am I going to do as a teacher? Say ‘sorry, I have to teach this lesson?’”
Other students spoke of “the stereotype that it’s a school for druggies,” “the stigma,” and “how the school is judged.”
Murkowski spoke up: “In the visits that I have around the state, you go visit some of the alternative schools and they are dubbed, ‘that’s where the losers go,’ ‘that’s where the druggies go,’ ‘that’s for the kids who couldn’t make it in a regular school.’ And then you get to the schools: what I’ve heard today has really been very empowering. The words that you’re using –- family and love and safe -– if a kid doesn’t feel safe in school, it’s pretty hard to learn.”
“Money is always a threat,” she added.
At the end of the talking circle, the students and the senator exchanged gifts.
Murkowski announced to the group that she is leaving them an American flag, which she said she does at every school she visits in Alaska.
The gift was accepted gratefully by the principal.
“Our flag keeps getting stolen, so we actually don’t have one, so we were thrilled that you’re bringing it,” Summer said. “We have a student who’s not here, but has committed to putting the flag up and taking it down every day, so that way maybe this flag won’t get taken.”
The senator also left a book: Sidney Huntington’s “Shadows on the Koyukuk: An Alaskan Native’s Life Along the River,” which she was surprised to learn had been written by the uncle of Philip Barker, one of the students in the talking circle .
In return, Pacific High students gave gifts to the senator, among them a signed card and a container of sockeye salmon smoked and jarred by the students in a subsistence class, and also a handmade piece of art.
“This is from the Gajaa Heen dance group,” said Demetri Lestenkoff, a member of the dance group, as he handed Murkowski a necklace with an ornate metal decoration created by Pacific High students in a Sitka Native Education Program art class. “Originally, it was a copper shield, but now it’s a form of currency within our culture.”
