Carcross Tagish First Nation School Project

I was in Whitehorse teaching my Red Seal Refresher Course when the call came in from Rachael Cardiff to the United Brotherhood of Carpenters union hall. Rachael was wondering if there were any union members available to come out to Carcross, YT., to maybe do a construction workshop with the students at the Carcross Tagish First Nations school.

Springtime in the North is the busiest time of year for working carpenters, and nobody was available. So, I took the call.
I went out and met with the principal, Larry Kiesling. Larry is a bundle of energy who was in tune with every minute resonation of every student in the school. He had a bunch of brand new tools and equipment and we got to work organizing the woodworking class area into a viable work shop. Once we had everything tickety-boo, Workers Compensation came in, did an inspection, and gave us the official Okee- Dokee.

I downloaded some picnic table plans off the internet and we ordered up the material. I started off with the Yukon Education Safety Manual, and we ran the kids through a comprehensive primer on PPE, and preventative and power tool safety, and Safe Work Practices, from the WorkSafe BC manual. The kids soaked this up like a sponge~!

The first project I had them tackle was a push stick for the table saw. I not only wanted to introduce them to the safe operation of the table saw, band saw, and disc sander, but I also wanted them to understand how easy it is to make a push stick~you never need to put your fingers in danger on the table saw.

Then we moved on to reading the blueprints for the picnic table, and sorting out a material list, which lead to a”cutting list”. Once we had the cutting list sorted out, we moved into using the new miter saw to create all the various pieces we would need to start building the tables.

It took a few trips out to Carcross, but we got the tables assembled in pretty short order. The kids were flushed with accomplishment; there’s nothing like making a plan and following it through to build confidence in emerging personalities.
I would like to thank both Rachael and Larry for giving me the opportunity to be a part of this project. And it’s nice to think of these picnic tables providing many years of service to all the future kids at the Carcross Tagish First Nations school~!

I even got to see the World’s Largest Stuffed Polar Bear, which was quite amazing.