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Junior Jack Roberts was the lone Wrangell High School swimmer to compete at the state meet in Anchorage over the weekend, coming off a first-place win in regionals. Roberts gave his best effort in the 200-yard individual medley and 100-yard freestyle, but it wasn’t enough to sink the competition. Roberts came on strong in each heat, powering through each lap. He finished ninth in the 200-yard individual medley preliminaries with a time of 2:06.48. The top eight swimmers advance to finals. In the 100-yard freestyle preliminaries, he finished e...
The Wrangell High School girls volleyball team traveled to Skagway to participate in the north seeding tournament last Saturday through Tuesday, winning 12 out of 13 sets and four matches in the first three days. The weekend’s scores are: Versus Haines: 25-17 (Wrangell), 25-16 (Wrangell) and 25-12 (Wrangell). Versus Skagway: 25-19 (Wrangell), 25-8 (Wrangell) and 25-9 (Wrangell). Versus Klawock: 25-18 (Wrangell), 25-19 (Wrangell), 22-25 (Klawock) and 25-16 (Wrangell). Versus Craig: 25-19 (Wrangell), 25-22 (Wrangell) and 25-20 (Wrangell). W...
Name calling. Spreading rumors. Shoving, tripping. Excluding. Those are just a few of the ways bullying can be perpetrated, and staff at Wrangell schools are working to prevent it and the damage and lasting trauma that can stem from it. About 20% of students ages 12 through 18 across the country reported being bullied, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ stopbullying.gov website. Of those students, 56% said they believed the bully “had the ability to influence other students’ perception of them.” Fifty percent...
Gov. Mike Dunleavy cares about Alaska and wants good things for its citizens. But that doesn’t change the fact that he has done serious and likely permanent damage to the state ferry system; that he has not supported adequate school funding; that he sliced the University of Alaska budget, cutting into student enrollment; and that his fixation on the size of the Permanent Fund dividend is politically popular but fiscally irresponsible. If re-elected, will Dunleavy’s second term be a repeat of his first year in office in 2019, when he was hea...
The wheels on the bus go round and round, but you might not hear them. Wrangell was the only school district in Alaska to be awarded with a $395,000 grant last month to purchase an electric school bus through the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean School Bus Program. The awards are the first year of a five-year program totaling $5 billion created by the Infrastructure Act signed into law a year ago. John Taylor, co-owner of Taylor Transportation, had been approached by a school bus manufacturer in Anchorage about the grant. Taylor T...
When Matthew Gore arrived in Wrangell on the evening of Oct. 21, he took his dogs for a walk in the park before getting on his boat, the Andromeda, which he had been storing at the Reliance Float since late June 2021. Immediately, something “felt off.” As he walked down the stairs, he tripped over objects that he didn’t remember placing there. After inspecting the entire vessel, he discovered that it had been stripped. The generator, charger, batteries, fans, power cable, laminate flooring and more had all been removed and the anchor had been...
The Wrangell High School wrestlers traveled last weekend to compete in the Sitka Slam, with many team members placing high and turning in fast pin times. Although team scores weren’t kept at the tournament, the number of pins were tracked, with the Wolves turning in the second-highest number at 48 pins. Mt. Edgecumbe had the most with 52. Randy Churchill led the Wrangell team, winning first place in his weight class and placing third overall in the competition with five pins. Ethan Blatchley and Vanessa Barnes also won first place in their w...
The Wrangell High School swim team returned from Juneau last weekend with plenty of personal bests and one regional champion heading to state. Junior Jack Roberts won the regional championship in the 100-yard freestyle and will be heading to the state competition in Anchorage this weekend. He also won third place in the individual medley. Each heat was a personal best for the athlete. “Jack had phenomenal races this weekend,” said head coach Jamie Roberts. “He dropped almost seven seconds off his 200-yard individual medley, which is a lot o...
Dozens of hands small and large held a firm grip on the 30-foot-long dugout canoe they pushed down Angoon's Front Street despite their shoes slipping on the rain-soaked road. Neither the potholes on the road nor the rain on Oct. 26 seemed to discourage the more than 50 Chatham School District students and Angoon residents from pushing what was the first dugout canoe made in Angoon since the U.S. Navy bombardment 140 years ago. The 1882 bombardment destroyed all but one of its fleet of dugout...
Nick Begich, who is running against fellow Republican Sarah Palin and Democratic incumbent Mary Peltola for Alaska’s single U.S. House seat, will be in Wrangell on Friday. He is the only one of the three leading candidates to schedule a visit to the community. His conservative platform includes deregulating Alaska minerals development and bolstering the state’s role in supplying resources to the nation. Peltola won the House seat in August to fill out the unexpired term of the late Rep. Don Young until January. The Nov. 8 general election wil...
HELP WANTED Wrangell Senior Center is seeking an assistant cook. $16/hour DOE. Position is 25 hours a week. Benefits include a 403b retirement account, employee assistance program, 12 paid holidays, paid time off and optional supplemental insurance. Background check required. Apply online at www.ccsak.org/jobs. For more information contact Solvay Gillen at 907-874-2066. HELP WANTED Wrangell Public Schools is accepting applications for the following positions for the 2022-2023 school year: Paraprofessionals: These are part-time positions...
Years of flat state funding create budget stress for schools across Alaska By James Brooks and Lisa Phu Alaska Beacon The Anchorage School District, which is considering the closure of six elementary schools amid a projected $68 million budget shortfall, isn’t the only district facing a major fiscal problem. At the end of the last school year, Fairbanks closed three schools. In Juneau, the school board is considering whether to fire specialists intended to help students recover reading skills lost during the COVID-19 pandemic. In rural A... Full story
Alaskans will elect a U.S. senator, a member of the U.S. House, a governor and several dozen state legislators on Nov. 8. It’s an important vote, with real consequences for the nation, the state’s future, school funding, the ferry system, civil liberties and social justice. And yet, judging from past turnouts in non-presidential election years, maybe half of Alaska’s registered voters will cast a ballot. Which means the other half stayed home — unconcerned, uninterested and unmoved in how their state and country are run. Really, 50% is a good b...
"Guys! Stop real quick! We need to make one adjustment because I'm seeing people get behind them," Jack Carney broadcasts to the room as he weaves about the grapplers engaged in practicing moves. He scans each pair, somehow seeing every athlete, every stance all at once. He stops to give them direction and they all focus intently on his instruction. "See this shoulder? You're going to punch it right here. Boom. I punch him. All my weight's on him, then I can block his spin. Push, snap and then...
The Lady Wolves are howling with excitement over their multiple victories last week. Over the course of three days last week, the Wrangell High School girls volleyball team beat five teams in five matches to rank first in south seeding for regionals in mid-November. Craig, Klawock, Haines, Skagway and Petersburg teams came to Wrangell to battle it out in the high school gym. The competitions were delayed somewhat because poor weather conditions led to travel delays by some of the teams....
A century ago on Nov. 7, 1922, Tlingit translator and civil rights advocate Tillie Paul Tamaree helped Charlie Jones, the seventh Chief Shakes, vote in a Wrangell municipal election. Her actions led to a court case that would secure the right to vote for Alaska Natives two years before the federal Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 extended citizenship to Native people across the United States. When she was 12 years old, Tamaree entered the Amanda McFarland Home for Girls in Wrangell to avoid an...
Oct. 19, 1922 The regular monthly meeting of the Parent-Teachers Association was held last Thursday evening at the schoolhouse. H. W. Gartley spoke forcibly and to the point regarding the need for a playground for children, aside from the playshed on the school grounds. Mr. Gartley’s talk met with enthusiastic approval, and he was asked to act as chairman of a playground committee to look into the matter and report at the next meeting on available sites for a public playground where the boys can play baseball with no fear of breaking windows, w...
With voter approval of a $3.5 million bond issue, the Wrangell School District wasted no time in moving ahead with its plan to go after a state grant as it works to fully fund needed repairs at its buildings. But before the district starts any work, it first must determine exactly what needs fixing so it can set priorities and assemble cost estimates. To that end, the school board voted Oct. 11 to appropriate up to $385,900 from the district’s major maintenance fund to pay for condition surveys of all three buildings. The fund has a current b...
School enrollment is heading in the right direction, but just slightly. After counting 257 students during the state-mandated annual tally last year, this year’s Wrangell enrollment count was at 266 as of last week, said Schools Superintendent Bill Burr. The school district had estimated 263 students when it put together its budget for the 2022-2023 school year. State funding, which provides more than 60% of the district’s operating budget, is based on enrollment, with districts statewide required to submit their count every October. The hig...
The Wrangell School District could face a financial squeeze in the next several years, forcing hard decisions over which programs get cut, what classes go away and how much staff is left. It’s not that the administration or staff did anything wrong. Just as school districts statewide, Wrangell has been waiting on some legislators and governors to put aside their biases against teacher unions, their personal views on political issues and their tendency to hold schools responsible for every shortcoming in society, and move to approve an i...
The state champs Wrangell High School cross country running team was honored last Friday at an assembly in the school gym. From left: Randy Churchill III, Ethan Blatchley, Ian Nelson, Daniel Harrison, Boomchain Loucks and Devlyn Campbell, and assistant coach Mason Villarma, shared in the moment. The team placed first at state in Anchorage the previous weekend, winning the championship for the first time in the school's history. Harrison came in first overall with a time of 17:29.1. (Photo by...
The Wrangell High School swim team traveled to Sitka last Friday and Saturday to compete in the town’s invitational swim meet, turning in three personal bests, four season bests and eight top 10 finishes. Head coach Jamie Roberts said the team has been working on breathing patterns and other techniques, and “sometimes, it takes a while for their practice patterns to translate into race patterns, as muscle memory can be challenging to overcome.” Despite that, the individual swimmers did well in their categories. Wrangell didn’t have a men’s r...
Former Wrangell real estate broker John L. Tullis Sr., 99, passed away peacefully with his two daughters present on Sept. 28 in Camas, Washington. Tullis was born on Jan. 16, 1923, in Pendleton, Oregon. He was raised on a ranch, caring for animals, pitching hay, building fences, cleaning the barn and cooking with his mom. He was one of six kids, second from the bottom. He drove a Model T Ford to high school and later sold it for $25. Serving in the Navy during World War II took him to the... Full story
Child care has been a pressing need in the community for some time, and the Wrangell Cooperative Association is hoping to address the issue at least in some part. Starting last week, the WCA distributed surveys on bulletin boards around town, on its website and on Facebook. The survey will help the organization assess how great the need is. “We’re looking to assess the need in our community as a whole,” said Esther Reese, tribal administrator for WCA. The organization is asking how many families need child care, what days of the week are neede...
In a relatively short season, the Wrangell High School boys cross country team went from training to champions. The team won the Division III state title last Saturday at the ASAA/First National Bank Alaska Cross Country Running Championships in Anchorage, making it the first in the program's history. Assistant coach Mason Villarma predicted the runners had the potential to make history for the school after only a couple of meets earlier in the season. That prediction came true with the team...