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  • At the Statewide Native Youth Games, you can hear the sound of fans cheering wildly with enthusiasm, yet somehow the sound of a human mimicking a seal cuts through the roar of the crowd. The art of the seal call is one of the many skills athletes pick up at the games that gives them a distinctly Indigenous flavor.
  • Dr. Theresa John performs with a dance group at opening ceremonies for a week-long listening and learning session on Native boarding schools at the Alaska Native Heritage Center in April.
    Photo by Rhonda McBride.
    The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition is traveling the country to collect oral histories from boarding school survivors about the abuse they experienced as children. At a stop in Anchorage, they heard from 20 survivors. Their stories will be preserved in a national archive available to the public.
  • When the Moment Comes is a play that brings light to a dark chapter in history, based on the true story of Baha'is, who were persecuted for their religious beliefs after the Islamic Revolution in Iran. A story that is both haunting and inspiring — that honors the memories of a group of men and women, executed in 1983 after they refused to renounce their faith.
  • Zooming across the Navajo Nation, a new non-profit called NDN Girls Book Club is bringing books written by Indigenous authors to various locations in the Navajo Nation.The team hopes they create community-wide change and education on the extensive world of Indigenous-written literature.
  • The national media dubbed the case the “Memory Card Murders,” because of the gruesome video Brian Smith recorded of his killings. During the trial, prosecutors raised another troubling possibility – that Smith had allegedly confided in others about his crime, including an Anchorage musician named Ian Calhoun. Activists have staged several protests, calling for Calhoun’s arrest.
  • Interest in Arctic sports, also known as Native Youth Olympics, is growing all over the world in Arctic nations beyond Alaska and Northern Canada. NYO advocates have pushed leaders of the North American Indigenous Games to include traditional Arctic sports for many years. Organizers have finally included them on a trial basis for its 2027 games in Calgary, but NYO fans say it'll take a lot more work to make Arctic sports an official part of the event.
  • Since the last census, the number of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) have grown in Anchorage — less than 10 percent in 2010 and more than 13 percent in 2022. Organizers of the first AAPI Anchorage Mayoral forum say they want to do away with the stereotype that the AAPI community is a "silent minority."
  • This year the Arctic Winter Games were held in the Ma -Su Valley, the first time this international competition has been in Alaska in a decade. Many call this event, which is held once every two years, the Olympics of the North. Alaska governor Wally Hickel and other Arctic Nation leaders founded the Arctic Winter Games in 1959. They believed that the peoples scattered across the Circumpolar North share a mutual identity — and in the case of large countries like Northern Canada and Alaska, perhaps have more in common with the rest of the Arctic than they do with the rest of their own countries.
  • Get out the Native Vote has worked hard to get more Natives to the polls in both local and national elections. Recently, the non-profit has branched out to 45 schools across Alaska.
  • With films like Killers of the Flower Moon winning critical acclaim, Native Americans have a lot to look forward to during this year's Academy Awards ceremony. Ariel Tweto, an Inupiaq TV personality and actress from Unalakleet, says it's an important milestone for Indigenous people.
  • An SD card ,with an almost unimaginable story, turned out to be the key to the murder trial of Brian Smith, a killer who targeted vulnerable Alaska Native women. During the trial, it was revealed that footage on the card came from a cellphone, stolen from Smith. Family members and advocates for Kathleen Henry and Veronica Abouchuk had to hear sounds from Smith's videos and see images that were horrific. And yet they came everyday to seek justice, to remind the court that the women were someone's daughters — and in Abouchuk's case, a mother and a grandmother.
  • After three weeks of testimony, the trial of serial killer Brian Smith came to a quick conclusion Thursday. The jury convicted Smith of all counts against him in the deaths of two Alaska Native women, who he targeted for their vulnerability. National media has followed the Smith murders closely, dubbing them the "Memory Card Murders." During the trial, the jury saw footage and photographs of the killings.