Alaska Sea Grant goes to school

Fish often congregate in schools. In Alaska’s coastal communities, so do potential fishermen. 

That’s why Alaska Sea Grant is increasing its emphasis on offering commercial fishing instruction to students in high school and even middle schools. This included recent training and outreach activities in Naknek, Metlakatla, and Hoonah, which gave students the opportunity to explore careers in the field while learning valuable job skills. 

“If you get all this hands-on experience in these classes before getting to the boat … you’ll be able to immediately help out and contribute,” noted Alaska Sea Grant Marine Advisory agent Tav Ammu, who co-taught the training in Naknek. “Your boat will be safer, you’re more likely to stay in fishing, and then potentially in the long term there might be more people getting into the industry.”

Ammu spent a week in April leading a group of eight high school students in two classes: an introductory course designed to teach students the basics of being a commercial drift gillnet crew member, and a class focused on setnetting. The courses were co-taught with local fisherman and setnet camp manager Catie Bursch and with Leann Cyr, executive director of the Alaska Marine Safety Education Association. The students came to Naknek from all over Bristol Bay with support from the Bristol Bay Regional Career and Technical Education (BBRCTE) Program, which provides weeklong in-person vocational courses to students across four school districts.

The curriculum combined classwork with lots of hands-on instruction. Students learned about proper knot-tying and fish-handling, PFD use and cold-water survival skills. They jumped into the pool in immersion suits, and used a small inflatable boat to practice person overboard recovery, swamping, and capsizing. They toured drift boats and setnet skiffs and heard presentations on subjects like float plans and interpersonal dynamics.

“Commercial fishing, and particularly salmon drift netting, is one of the most—if not the most—dangerous jobs in the U.S. and in Alaska,” Ammu noted. “So teaching safety concerns and how to identify and address them before they occur helps the students build that safety foundation that helps the boat and the industry.”

Eligible students earned a Coast Guard-recognized certification as an onboard drill conductor. The classes constituted one step in Alaska Sea Grant’s Skipper Apprenticeship Program, which enables aspiring fishermen, both students and adults, to earn microcredentials and increase their job skills. The program includes classes ranging from first aid to business planning to small engine repair. “If you’re going to be a fisherman,” Ammu noted, “you either have to have those skills or you have to pay many thousands of dollars to someone who does have those skills.” 

One of the Naknek students, recent Newhalen School graduate Ryley Young, became the first person to earn “Greenhorn” status in the apprenticeship program, which means he completed five of the roughly 20 classes needed to complete the program.

In Metlakatla and Hoonah, Alaska Sea Grant instructors mixed small-group instruction with larger community outreach. Instructors John Williams and Gabe Dunham began the Metlakatla trip with a public presentation about mental health and communication skills in a commercial fishing setting. The next morning they addressed a school assembly, mostly talking about lifejacket use and even holding a PFD fashion show they cheekily dubbed the Metlakatla Met Gala.

The instructors then taught a group of 15 high- and middle-school students the basics on subjects like safety, seafood quality and daily life as a crewmember. Students shuffled between four stations, where they learned about knots, splices, boat-handling and beginning mechanics. The Metlakatla instruction concluded with three students completing a two-day onboard Drill Conductor certification class. A few weeks earlier, Dunham, who leads the Alaska Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program, followed a similar itinerary in Hoonah. Eight students undertook skills training, followed by a drill conductor course which six students completed.

Williams said the educational offerings are designed to benefit students with no experience in the fishing world, as well as those who already have some exposure to fishing. “There’s a lot of interest coming out of high school in a rural community in fishing because your dad or mom or grandparents did it,” said Williams, who works for Alaska Sea Grant as a fisheries workforce specialist. “So we’re trying to give them some of the basics to work on a boat and to understand boating safety, and also to touch on the business of commercial fishing.”

Both the Metlakatla and Hoonah classes were requested by local educators—a Metlakatla school counselor and an education coordinator with the Hoonah Indian Association. Williams said the continued requests for these sorts of programs point to a community need. 

“Lots of teachers and counselors have been asking about them,” he said. “It overlaps well with vocational and tech instruction, for students who are studying outboards or diesel engines or welding. All those skills translate to the commercial fishing industry very well.”