Indigenous Science Camp at Ah Pah
Oct. 15th–17th
You and your family are invited to celebrate the great STEM related work being conducted in Indian Country. FYI, Ah Pah is a rebuilt traditional Yurok village; a place of ceremony. While there we will be participating as villagers working together to implement this year's camp. This is NOT a camping trip that involves drinking alcohol. Willard Carlson, Head Man of the village, has recreated Ah Pah as a place of healing, maintaining sobriety, and ceremony, as well as, being the College for Traditional Knowledge!
For overnight campers be prepared for Humboldt County fall weather (i.e. potentially cold and wet, as well as warm sunny fall days).
Nothing is firm yet, but I hope to schedule it like this:
- Keith Parker opens us up Friday evening with something like, Yurok Fisheries now, the future, & your inherent right to be an indigenous scientist.
- Saturday, get things started with Food Sovereignty from Cynthia's team.
- Followed by any UAV participants sharing (if any show up) and INRSEP+ student contributions to STEM work in Indian Country. We have potentially 15 INRSEP+ students willing to do short presentations.
- We'll accommodate Tianna's availability as she will update us and share about the Condor reintroduction project (late Sunday morning is an option for her as well).
- Victoria and maybe Perguish to share around dinner time on Saturday. I've asked them to talk about indigenous relationship to the Klamath River, the connection of the Yurok language to that, and the overlap with language, culture, & science.
- Maybe a movie night or campfire stories with Gerald Jones on Saturday evening.
- Somewhere in all of this hopefully we bust out the Ah Pah strippers as a cultural activity. (Clean, fillet, strip, & load the smoke house with salmon.)
Safety:
I've begun to encourage a culture within our students at INRSEP+ that I call "stacking the negatives!" Basically I suggest and keep suggesting that they get routine COVID-19 tests. It is quick, free, and easy for campus folks to get. Wednesday It took me 5 minutes at the great hall to take a COVID-19 test. That simple… POW!!! Even though we are all vaccinated, to protect Ah Pah's safety, I'm encouraging all that I come in contact with to stack the negative tests for a month ahead of Ah Pah!
This is what I've got so far. I'll prepare to feed about 20 to 30 participants.
