Sofia Stuart-Rasi

3 weeks ago | kucb.org | Sofia Stuart-Rasi

Classrooms at Unalaska City High School were usually empty on Friday evenings as students and staff headed off for the weekend. But not this winter evening. A group of people circled around a table playing cards. They were exchanging Go Fish cards, but it wasn't quite your typical Go Fish game. One player said to another, “chaaskax̂ anuxtakuqing.” The other player responded “chaaskax̂ matalakaqing.

3 weeks ago | adn.com | Sofia Stuart-Rasi

For the first time in Unalaska City School District history, two Unalaska students will compete in the National History Day competition. Eighth-grader Natnicha “Michelle” Lord and sophomore Crina Bivol each created websites that earned first place in their age groups at the state contest, where judges selected 20 projects out of 60 to advance to nationals. Lord’s research focuses on the environmental impacts of military debris left in the Aleutian Islands since the 1940s.

1 month ago | alaskapublic.org | Sofia Stuart-Rasi

A Southcentral Alaska tribal program that monitors a deadly shellfish toxin on the state's beaches has been halted, as the federal government evaluates its funding. In the summer of 2020, a person in Unalaska collected mussels and snails on a local beach and ate them. The shellfish contained extremely high levels of the toxin that causes paralytic shellfish poisoning, or PSP.

1 month ago | kucb.org | Sofia Stuart-Rasi

In the summer of 2020, a person in Unalaska collected mussels and snails on a local beach and ate them. Hours later, they died from Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning or PSP. The shellfish contained extremely high toxin levels, causing symptoms of numbness, weakness and pain. The person ended up dying, despite being medevaced to a hospital in Anchorage. To prevent tragedies like this, the Knik Tribe in South Central Alaska has been running a PSP monitoring program for nearly two decades.

1 month ago | adn.com | Sofia Stuart-Rasi

The name speaks for itself — Sitka Spruce Park on Amaknak Island has dozens of spruce trees, creating a rare forest-like sanctuary. Regional lands are known for their tundra valleys filled with grasses, plants and bushes, not a 10-foot tree in sight. But that changed in Unalaska during the 1800s when Russian colonizers planted many Sitka spruce trees on the island.