BYTE visits youth in Ross River and Faro!

There’s something about turning off the main drag onto the Robert Campbell Highway that’s a little bit special. Natalie has been to Ross River and Faro several times in the past few years, so she’s getting to know the drive and the communities well. As for me, I’d never been before I decided to join Natalie on her trip to Ross River and Faro in November.

Ross River surprised me with its beautiful landscape. Unlike Whitehorse and Dawson City, Ross River sits in an open valley, so the dark days of November seem a bit brighter in this community. I was also surprised by the amazing group of youth we met.

Right from the beginning, youth were willing to tell stories, play games, and hang out with us. Natalie’s pizza and games nights obviously have a reputation from the past few visits there, because over 20 youth and young adults dropped by the youth centre to say hi when we were there.

For the next couple of days, we ran Leadership and This Is Our Land workshops in the school for the grade 7-8 class and the grade 9-10 class. We learned a lot from youth about the land around Ross River—they clearly have a deep knowledge of the land around them that they’ve been learning since they were very young.

During our Yukon animal trivia activity with the grade 7-8 class, we heard youth use the Kaska words for animals before the English word. It’s just one example of how the Ross River School is working hard to promote the Kaska language, culture, and way of life to their students. I was excited to see so much cultural pride present in the school and the community.

After our visit to Ross River, we hopped over to Faro for the evening, where we ran our From First Job to Dream Job workshop at the Rec Centre. It turns out that the youth in Faro have lots of fantastic ideas about what they want as careers when they get older, and we hope we helped provide a bit of guidance about how to get there.

After a quick Safe Partying workshop in the Faro School the next morning (and after getting some hugs and a free toque from the youth at the school!), we hit the road. Faro was an incredibly welcoming community and I loved being able to catch up with youth I’ve met at BYTE’s annual Leaders In Training conference and other youth events.

Thanks so much to Ross River and Faro for having us! Natalie plans to visit again in January to deliver Healthy Minds workshops, and we can’t wait to come back.