A Call to the North Country ~ VISIONS Alaska

Teen community service programs are now available in hundreds of locations throughout the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, the Caribbean, and more. Less common nowadays are month-long service and cultural immersion experiences inside the U.S. where non-mainstream cultures continue to survive (albeit not necessarily thrive).

VISIONS offers teen community service programs in the U.S. on Montana Plains Indian reservations (since 1991), in Alaska native villages (since 1995), and on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, the third, most recent VISIONS program in the U.S., created in response to Hurricane Katrina.

Over the past 20-plus years we have observed how interest in program locations waxes and wanes and waxes again. Some locations may hold greater or lesser allure than others for a spell. And while we know this is the natural way of things, it still pains us when a rich, uniquely bracing program site goes into a kind of short-term hibernation for lack of robust interest. This was the case with our Montana programs some time ago, which now enjoy such huge interest that we have waiting lists for them again. For the past two seasons VISIONS Alaska has been “hibernating”.

We began working in the Alaska Interior in Athabascan native communities in 1995 and continued through the 2008 season. Few peoples have ranged so widely on the earth’s surface as the Athabascans whose culture and language reach back 200,000 years, beyond the ice age. Until the 19th century they lived undisturbed in the Alaska Interior. Their language is polite and expressive, pleasurable to the ear, and marvelously sophisticated for its descriptive breadth. Perhaps one of the few things commonly known about Athabascan language is that there are more than a dozen adjectives to describe the characteristics of what we call, simply, snow.

Athabascans have carved out unhurried lives in the rugged wilds. Today Athabaskans are resourceful at combining modern technology with generations of aesthetic knowledge and skill at fishing and smoking salmon, hunting moose and caribou, snaring and trapping smaller fur bearing animals. They seem to draw quiet peace and good humor from the vast landscape. They lead simple lives relying on subsistence hunting, fishing, beading, woodcarving, trapping and gathering for much of their local economy. Cash employment is hard to come by and seasonal.

VISIONS Alaska participants have had unparalleled access to Athabascan life that resonates with the old ways and still affords glimpses of ancient cultural traditions. Students have participated in traditional beading, steam baths, fishing, story-telling, cleaning and drying salmon, and more. Because Alaska is exceptional and our partnerships there enduring, we’ll keep offering this program, confident that the pendulum of interest will swing back its way.

When it does, awaiting us is an extraordinary opportunity to live in Tetlin Village, nestled on the Tetlin River, a 20-mile drive off the main highway on a road that wends through a landscape that surpasses breathtaking. In our last season in Alaska in 2008, Tetlin, the most traditional of villages in the Fairbanks region, invited VISIONS to live in the community. We aim to accept this special invitation for summer season 2011.

Here is a tiny fraction of the comments received over the years from Alaska participants about their experiences.

…I can truthfully say I have never had so much fun with such amazing individuals completing projects that would and will benefit so many people in my entire life. I have no regrets on this trip, and this has been the best summer (hands down) in my life—and doing community service. Who knew?... The recreational activities on this trip were just another plus. Personally, I found the working and job sites fun, and the activity that followed was a great “second helping,” if you will. The staff were extremely creative. I had a good time talking with and learning from the elders; this was among the high-points in the trip for me…

Patrick Fleming

Samantha Johnson

Blaire Sacks