Arctic grads empowered by conference

February 3rd 9:30 am | Hannah Heimbuch    

A record number of Arctic youth joined the 2012 Conference of Young Alaskans in Juneau last month to discuss the hottest topics facing the state today. Recent graduates of Kotzebue and Barrow schools joined the 55-delegate gathering of 16 to 25 year olds to lend their voice to the discussion.

At least 30 percent of the representatives were Alaska Native, and this conference had the largest rural representation to date, said Nils Andreassen, Institute of the North managing director.

The conference gave delegates — representing 28 communities from around the state — the opportunity to discuss a wide variety of issues facing Alaska and the role youth opinion can play in current and future decisions. They divided into groups to conquer issues from education to oil, from economic progress to cultural preservation.

"My experience was really eye-opening to the perspective of the north, and how the north fits into the rest of the world, the rest of the state and the rest of the country," said 2010 Kotzebue graduate Hannah Atkinson. "And how the north will fit into the future," added Atkinson, a sophomore at Lewis and Clark College in Oregon.

"We have a fresh, really progressive perspective," she said. "I think it's really important for other young people in rural communities to know they can have their voice heard and they do have a valuable perspective."

The Institute of the North began hosting the Conference of Young Alaskans in 2006, in the hopes of inspiring young Alaskans to connect on the issues facing the state.

"For the institute, this is an important opportunity to support young Alaskans on the one hand, and to educate them on the other. To educate them about the critical policy issues that maybe they weren't aware of," said

Responses from delegates since 2006 have been positive, Andreassen said.

"They speak to not being engaged before, now they're going to be. They were leaving the state, now they're staying," he said.

Andreassen and two other IN staff worked with a youth steering committee to organize the 2012 gathering.

This conference was the second time around for Kotzebue native Reid Magdanz — he attended the conference in 2009.

Magdanz, who is now a senior in environmental studies at Yale University, said the two conferences offered him different opportunities, partly due to his change in age and partly due to a change in representation. The first, he said, gave him valuable insight into the concerns of urban Alaska, a place he knew little about and had almost no connections to.

"At this last one, I thought that we had a much stronger rural voice," Magdanz said, adding that outspoken delegates from a number of Bush communities provided valuable perspective to the group about issues facing rural Alaska.

"COYA is great because it allows you to hear a lot about other parts of the state you might not know from your personal life," he said.

The topics covered were as varied and complex as the issues Alaska's politicians focus on, but some produced stronger opinions than others.

"There's always plenty of talk about natural resources, oil, mining, but it's a little more difficult because those are issues that not many 16 to 25 year olds have many first-hand experiences or detailed knowledge of," Magdanz said.

He added that the impassioned conversations originated in areas youth DO have experience in — education and culture.

"There was a lot of discussion about the social issues facing the state. Cultural traditions, domestic violence, suicide, sexual assault — those were pretty hot topics and resulted in some of the most interesting and heartfelt debates there," he said.

Tiana Elkins — a 2011 Barrow graduate — is a freshman in college at the University of Alaska Fairbanks studying elementary education. She said that couple of days in Juneau taught her more about the state she loves than she had acquired in her previous 18 years.

"A lot of people within the state, especially kids just out of high school, really don't know what's going on within their communities and other communities," Elkins said. "These people helped me so much. They showed me so much I can do to help my community."

Elkins wants to return to Barrow to teach after she graduates, and true to that interest she said education topics were most important to her.

Atkinson and Magdanz also expressed a strong desire to return to Alaska after completing their educations, and continuing to make their voices heard on issues vital to Alaskans. All three described how COYA gave them invaluable tools to do just that.

"We used our experience to create a vision for what we want it to look like in the future," Atkinson said.

The delegation from the Arctic region also included Barrow graduate Paige Bowen, Kotzebue graduate Desiree Strickland and Sam and Jenna Schmidt from Nome.

The Institute hopes to continue this conference every three years for many to come, and is considering adding reunion gatherings for past conference participants to revisit past goals and ideals.

A small Anchorage contingent will make a final presentation of the 2012 COYA findings to the Anchorage school board in February.

A similar presentation of the resolutions reached will take place before the Alaska legislature in March. Eight 2012 delegates, voted in by their peers, will represent that group.

Elkins hopes the legislature gives serious consideration to the heartfelt resolutions reached by the gathering of young Alaskans.

"This is what we want. This is what your youth have called for," she said.

 

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