Podunk Below the Masthead (Friday, January 29, 2010)

A look at the concerns of the city's youth, staying the course on fish farm moratoriums and the city's hotel owners are feeling a little price gouged by the City of Prince Rupert, some of the items of note for Friday's news cycle.

Daily News, front page, headline story

HOY SIS TS'AL... STUDENTS PARTICIPATE IN UNIQUE PROJECT -- Some background on a multi media art installation project from the combined forces of the city's two high schools. The project known as "Putting on a Face" or "Hoy sis ts'al" was created by 20 local students who examined some of the social issues in the community that were of concern to them. Their finished work is on display at the Pacific coast School on 2nd Avenue West.

There will be no expansion of fish farms in the province, until the Federal Government assesses the state of the fishery on the West coast under its recently expanded mandate of control of the aquaculture industry on the coast. DFO will now be taking control of the regulation of the industry which until recent times was under the direction of the provincial Ministry of Agriculture and Lands. The move to keep on with the moratorium was greeted as good news by Joy Thorkelson, of the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union, though she has concerns as to how long that moratorium will remain in place.

An update on the city's missing time capsule outlines that with the clock ticking down to March 10th, the search for the capusle has yet to unearth the mementos of the past, despite the best efforts of a UBC doctorate student who has been on the quest over the last week, a search that even included a tip from a psychic all to no avail..

More previews of the upcoming BC northern winter games, a look at the curling scene and a preview of this weekends basketball showcase at PRSS which will feature the Rainmakers senior squad taking on a team from Ketchikan, Alaska on Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon, Ketchikan also has a game set with Charles Hays on Monday afternoon at 2 pm.

(Archive for Daily News Articles for January 28, 2010 )

The Northern View
Prince Rupert hoteliers take City to task over cost of doing business -- A number of the city's hotel are expressing their concerns at the city's process for charging sewer rates on their establishments, a cost that the owners suggest is a fair amount more costly than other northwest communities (see article here)

CFTK TV 7 News
Power Line Review About to Begin -- A brief synopsis of the move towards the construction of the Northwest Transmission Line, a process now underway as B-C Transmission Corporation formally began the quest for an environmental review on the proposed project.(see article here)

CFTK TV 7 News

Mixed Emotions about Olympic Flame in Kitimat, says Monaghan -- As the Olympic torch relay makes its way towards the Northwest on Monday, the Mayor of Kitimat outlines the atmosphere in her city as the residents come to terms with the pending closure of the Eurocan pulp mill (see article here)

Queen Charlotte Islands Observer

All native tournament starts Feb. 14 -- Teams from Haida Gwaii are putting in their final practices and working out their travel details as Prince Rupert's All Native Basketball Tournament gets closer to the start date of February 14th (see article here)

CBC News Northern British Columbia, Daybreak North
The return of local content on the CBC website continues to experience delays as technical woes appear to be continuing. The CBC has once again revised their start up date for the new service, advising that the site will launch "shortly".

Daily News, front page, headline story

Hoy sis ts’al... students participate in unique project

By George T. Baker
The Daily News

Friday, January 29, 2010

In age of social networking programs on the Internet, the power of teenaged relationships has become a subject of much attention.

In Prince Rupert, two local high schools teamed up for a project that delved into the way teens relate to one another and the challenges often associated with growing up. What came out was a mutli-media art installation project called “Putting on a Face” or “Hoy sis ts’al” which is currently on display at Pacific Coast School.

The project was designed by the McCreary Centre Society’s Aboriginal Next Steps. The ANS started in 2008 and was developed as a response to research that suggested that even though there are a number of serious health issues that face Aboriginal youth living in communities throughout B.C. there are many aboriginal young people making healthy choices and taking less health risks than they were a
decade ago.

The initial planning for the project was taken on by a group that included Charles Hays Secondary School teachers, Pacific Coast School and Aboriginal Education. Carla Rourke and Sandra Carlick along with Miguel Borges, worked with Debbie Leighton Stephens, Tanis Calder, Steve Riley, and Sandy Jones and collaborated with Provincial Coordinator Sherry Simon.

Anne Smythe and Tiana Albert worked on the grant proposal under Rourke’s guidance.
In all, 20 students were encouraged to sign up for the program that would run two days. The students chosen were not neccessarily considered “model students” but were considered to be willing to take on a project of this kind.

“Putting on a Face was about people pretending to be something that they are not and exploring the superficial qualities of our society, of friendship and the lack of honesty we sometimes seem to be faced with,” explained Rourke.

“The underpinning of the project was not to dwell on what is happening, but to focus on the change that can happen.”

Working with McCreary facilitators Hari Alluri and Nadia Chaney, the students were engaged in team building exercises as well as idea mapping to decide what they wanted their installation theme to be about.
The students were asked to formalize three themes around relationships they felt were prevalent in Prince Rupert and after some discussion, the students decided upon substance abuse, harassment and bullying as major issues facing teenagers in Prince Rupert.

While the themes may not seem surprising, what impressed Rourke the most was that the kids were able to pick a medium they loved and felt comfortable with and were able to use that to evoke their message on the power of relationships, be they positive or negative.

“I think it is crucial to focus on the positive. We had a lot of exercises on trust and a lot of working on expressing their feelings. It was about moving towards their goals,’ said Rourke.

Because it was a multi-media installation, students were able to choose from photography to literary might or drawings, with students having the option to expand. What came out of it was a media-induced explosion of ideas. In fact, the students found the photography so enticing they shot 400 frames. This was too much for the purposes of the project and students were asked to edit that number down to 100 pics.

The Daily News has provided a couple of poems here, but there were many more written that provided the student’s point of view of how the themes affected them personally or how the themes skewed their perception of Teenaged Prince Rupert.

Eric Ridley’s poem on friendship plays up on the themes that relationships have an important positive relevance to growing up.

“Friendship is good you get to meet new people that
you don’t know or never seen before or someone new
to this place.”

In a different vain, Anne Smyth discovered that there is a magnetic sense between friends that borders on dependency, whether that be seen as a positive or negative.

The ONE > CRB <

The door open`s i see his beautiful face,
that feel`s like i haven`t seen for awhile.
He smiles my favourite smile,give`s me his
heartful hug that i`ve been hurting to feel.
The need of his touch.
He speak`s to me,it make`s my heart
race,my head feels much better.
He keeps that smile on my face.
If he`s gone for a lil bit ,i`ll go insane.
He`s the only one who keeps me sane.

Smythe sees herself at crossroads right now. She’s 19 and about to graduate from CHSS. She is either going to enter culinary school in Terrace or begin training as a youth worker at a college in Nanaimo.

If she goes the latter route, the project will have given her an indication of how she’ll be able to work with youth.

“One thing we learned is that you can’t really force people together and if you don’t agree then at least we could put with one another,” she explained.

Friend and classmate Jade Doolan, 19, is also graduating this June. He said the themes seemed to point friendship and how that eventually plays itself out during the teenage years of 13 to 18.

“When friendship comes into the picture it leads to choices. Those choices seem to be based on peer pressure and the person you are dealing with,” said Doolan.

Both kids said they would recommend the project. Rourke added that any student who was with the original group would be asked to come back in 2010-11 to help facilitate the next group.