In addition to learning more about the Yup’ik way of life, the relevant instruction trips allow us to harvest food for the winter.  Some of the food we harvest is served to the community at the annual Fall Feed, an event where the students share what they have harvested and what they have learned on the relevant instruction trips.  During the fall feed, student projects and presentations are shared with parents, guardians, and the entire community.  In doing so the community becomes more involved in the school programs and has a more complete understanding of what the relevant instruction trips are all about.  Any food harvested but not needed for the Fall Feed is given to families in town that need it.

During the relevant instruction trips, each teacher assigns different activities for students to complete based on the Alaska Academic State Standards.  For English class we kept daily journals and answered specific writing prompts.  For social studies we use GPS coordinates to plot the location of important sites like camp, where nets are set, and successful harvests areas.  For science and math we measure and count everything we catch or harvest in order to create graphs and calculate population characteristics.  The data from these different learning activities are then brought back into the classroom and we discuss them, manipulate them, and turn the data into projects aligned with the State of Alaska Standards.