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Yup’ik and Inupiaq spelling bee inspires students to learn

Sammy Canguayar Jackson III and Darrel Tuuya Owen from Akiak wait for their turn.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Sammy Canguayar Jackson III and Darrel Tuuya Owen from Akiak wait for their turn.

The statewide Yup’ik language spelling bee was born, when one of Freda Dan’s sons came home beaming after he won a prize in an English spelling bee. She wondered: What kind of an impact would a Yup’ik spelling bee have on children?

Photo by Rhonda McBride
Freda Dan, founder of the statewide Yup'ik Spelling Bee, seated at the far right. Freda prepares all the materials for the competition, which includes a list of about 300 words, rotated each year, along with their definitions and sentences showing how the words are used, as well as student exercises.

Dan got to work on the first statewide Yup’ik spelling bee in what today remains a grass roots, all-volunteer effort.

Fast-forward to a dozen years later. The Yup’ik competition is still going strong and now incorporates Inupiaq – two Alaska Native languages in a fight for survival.

The answer to Dan’s first question has some encouraging news. This annual event seems to have planted seeds of hope in communities across the state – that language can be saved if you work at it.

At this year’s statewide spelling bee, which was held on Saturday at the Central Lutheran Church in downtown Anchorage, Freda Dan put her family to work, registering students, taking photographs and serving refreshments.

Dan doesn’t get paid to organize this event – and receives very little in the way of donations.

But she’s proud of the plaques for the winners, which feature hand-carved masks, donated by the Bering Strait Native Corporation. They are pieces of art all by themselves, which students and parents took time to admire as they arrived.

Each winner of the Yup'ik and Inupiat spelling bees received a plaque with a hand-carved mask.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Each winner of the Yup'ik and Inupiat spelling bees received a plaque with a hand-carved mask.

The atmosphere in the room seemed deceptively calm, but many, like Debra Jackson, wrestled with their inner emotions.

“I’m like nervous for these kids,” said Debra Ayalgaria Jackson, who is the coach and Yup’ik language teacher for Akiak, a Kuskokwim River village in Southwest Alaska. She lets out a big sigh.

“Practice. Practice. Practice,” Jackson’s mantra for the past year.

She’s been working with her students since last fall, using a packet Dan prepared, which includes a list of about 300 words that rotate every year. There are also materials to help the students learn not just the words, but what they mean, and how to use them in sentences.

Debra Jackson from Akiak gives some last minute advice and encouragement to her grandson, Sammy Cungauyar Jackson III.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Debra Jackson from Akiak gives some last minute advice and encouragement to her grandson, Sammy Cungauyar Jackson III.

Dan also included exercises for the students and information about the Yup’ik alphabet system, which isn’t easy to learn, because it uses apostrophes, symbols and combinations of letters to represent sounds that aren’t in the English language.

The modern Yup’ik spelling system, or orthography, is fairly new, created by Yup’ik scholars in the 1960’s. It revamped an older alphabet, developed by the Moravian church in the 1930’s to translate the Bible. For years, the two spelling systems caused confusion. But today, the modern system is fully embraced, and the spelling bee helps to reinforce it.

For Akiak parents like Sheila Aiggailnguq Williams-Carl, the spelling bee has also helped to reawaken community-wide interest in keeping the Yup’ik language, or Yugtun, alive.

“We converse a majority of the time with each other in English,” she says.

Williams-Carl tries to compensate by speaking to her children in Yug’tun and is especially proud of her daughter, Megan. Although she’s only in the fourth grade, she’s done well at both school and district-level spelling bees, which have helped her become more disciplined and more confident.

“A lot of kids have a hard time with public speaking and getting up in front of a crowd. So, in that way it's been good for her,” Williams-Carl said. “She's a very quiet and very shy student, but she is really determined.”

Megan Cakillar’ Carl of Akiak, who was not quite big enough to reach the podium, but one of the stand-outs at the Yup’ik Spelling Bee. She was in contention for third place but lost the tie-breaker. Her mom, Sheila Williams Carl, is sitting in the back row in the middle. She says her daughter is shy, but participation in the spelling bee has given her more confidence.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Megan Cakillar’ Carl of Akiak, who was not quite big enough to reach the podium, but one of the stand-outs at the Yup’ik Spelling Bee. She was in contention for third place but lost the tie-breaker. Her mom, Sheila Williams Carl, is sitting in the back row in the middle. She says her daughter is shy, but participation in the spelling bee has given her more confidence.

Megan is so shy, she whispered into the microphone, letters for words like Cingssiik, which means “Little People” -- elf-like beings, who wear cone-shaped hats that look like fish traps.

She was a few letters off, so she didn’t earn any points for that word -- but even though she was one of the youngest at this year’s spelling bee, she held her own against eighth graders and finished in the top third overall.

Jackson, her coach, says Megan and the rest of the Akiak team show a lot of promise

“I'm so proud of them,” she said. “They may be younger, but they still have so many years, they still have until eighth grade. They're going to be perfect.”

This is Megan Cakillar' Carl's second year in the spelling bee. The fourth grade Akiak student holds her on among the older students.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
This is Megan Cakillar' Carl's second year in the spelling bee. The fourth grade Akiak student holds her on among the older students.

Perfection in spelling, especially for Indigenous languages, takes persistence. And the spelling bee takes that into account.

If a word is misspelled, the judge says, “Quyana,” or thank you, a polite signal to the student that the word was misspelled and for the next contestant to give it a try. In several cases, it took many tries, with everyone waiting to hear the word “Asirrtuq,” which means “Good,” confirming the word was spelled correctly.

Two-time Yup’ik Spelling Bee champ Alayna Pasrataar Canoe holds up her plaque that features a hand-carved mask.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Two-time Yup’ik Spelling Bee champ Alayna Pasrataar Canoe holds up her plaque that features a hand-carved mask.

Nunam Iqua’s team heard asirrtuq a lot. It swept all three top spots in the Yup’ik spelling bee. Alayna Pasrataar Canoe, an eighth grader, took home the first-place trophy.

“It feels good, winning,” she said, a feeling she has experienced for the second year in a row.

Her coach and Yup’ik teacher, Savanna Strongheart, said the news made her feel a little light- headed.

“My goal was, ever since I started, was to get one, two, three -- and this year I have one, two, three,” Strongheart said. “So, I'm like all excited, and I want to scream.”

Nunam Iqua swept the top three places this year with Alayna Pasrataar Canoe in first place, Tieran Maqaruaq Ignatius in second, and Kirsten Arnayaraq Akaran Manumik in third.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Nunam Iqua swept the top three places this year with Alayna Pasrataar Canoe in first place, Tieran Maqaruaq Ignatius in second, and Kirsten Arnayaraq Akaran Manumik in third.

The spelling bee came full circle this year for many, who have been involved since it began 12 years ago.

One of the students, who took second place in that very first spelling bee, returned as a guest speaker.

Casey Cakartaar Jack (right) sits in the audience. When he was 13-years-old, he was at the podium for the very first statewide spelling bee. Today, he's an adjunct professor of Yup'ik at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Casey Cakartaar Jack (right) sits in the audience. When he was 13-years-old, he was at the podium for the very first statewide spelling bee. Today, he's an adjunct professor of Yup'ik at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

When Casey Jack was 13-years-old, he represented the tiny Bering Sea village of Stebbins in the spelling bee. Today, he’s an adjunct professor of Yup’ik language at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and says, it was the spelling bee which sparked his passion for Native languages.

“One of the defining moments I would say,” Jack said.

He also finds it impressive that the spelling bee still lives on, mostly through volunteer efforts.

“It shows that people still care, and our language and culture still mean a lot to us,” said Jack, who believes widespread literacy is the key to keeping the language alive.

“Nowadays, you can still find people who read and write in Yup’ik,” Jack said, “but they’re few and far between, and mostly elders.”

Jack says the spelling bee helps to raise awareness about the Yup’ik writing system, one of the building blocks of literacy.

While the Yup’ik spelling bee had four schools involved, there was only one Inupiaq team, which hailed from Brevig Mission.

“The spelling bee is still in its beginning stages, only being on its third year,” Jack said. “But I have faith that it will grow, just as the Yup’ik spelling bee has.”

Cameron Tocktoo from Brevig Mission, winner of the Inupiaq Spelling Bee.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Cameron Tocktoo from Brevig Mission, winner of the Inupiaq Spelling Bee.

Jack thinks of students like Cameron Kakshuk Tocktoo, who took first place in the Inupiaq spelling bee, as trail blazers.

Jack encouraged the students to keep up with their studies, because there are many future jobs teaching Native language and culture.

Darrel Tuuya Owen, a fourth grader from Akiak, did not seem phased by the crowd. He spelled out his words in a loud, clear voice.
Photo by Rhonda McBride
Darrel Tuuya Owen, a fourth grader from Akiak, did not seem phased by the crowd. He spelled out his words in a loud, clear voice.

For Jack, the teachable moment was watching the students give their best effort. Win or lose, it all spells success. Asirrtuq.