After over 50 days of being split between the District Office and Gladys Jung Elementary, Ayaprun Yupik Immersion school students are set to move to the Kipusvik building next month. Principal Sam Crow said he spoke to the project manager and superintendent who hoped that students could start their first day at the new building on Tuesday, March 15 after their spring break.
“We’re real glad to have a place at the District Office and at Gladys Young but were really looking foreword to kids and teachers, and all of us we’re really ready to be together under one roof,” Crow said.
Lower Kuskokwim School Officials moved the Ayaprun students to the District Office and Glady’s Jung soon after the fire in November of last year. Kuskokwim Learning Academy students were moved to the Yuut Elitnaurviat dorms and their facility.
Crow said LKSD was originally planning on having the school ready earlier but complications delayed the projected February move.
“You know we tried to shoot for February and of course with trying to do construction in the middle of winter we ran into some time schedules that made it for a little longer job,” said Crow
LKSD hired some architects from Anchorage who designed the interior with the school’s mission in mind. Crow said it’s already shaping up.
“Downstairs in the electronics and on the main floor is going to be mostly all of our Yugtun classes, and we’re trying to make it so the upstairs is going to be the classrooms where we have half Yugtun classes and half English classes,” Crow said.
The Lower Kuskokwim School District began leasing the Kipusvik building from the Bethel Native Corporation in December at a rate of $50,000 a month plus utilities. They plan to lease the building for three to five years until, hopefully, the district can build a new school. LKSD officials say the district is currently working with the insurance company to try and make that happen.
Charles Enoch is a reporter at KYUK in Bethel.
