Tuktut Nogait National Park

This performer sang a rap song she wrote about keeping it real and being proud of her ancestry.

“ I thought this would be really boring, but after last night I was stoked,” said Douglas Price of the Inuvik Regional Youth Conference(IRYC). “The Ihuman beatbox was pretty cool, and to see Gerry Kisoun breakdance was fun.”

Such a change in perception is common amongst the IRYC’s 90 participants, made up of youth from the ISR, Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic. This is no stuffy conference. Some of the sessions were: break dancing, kung fu, grafitti art, traditional storytelling, hip hop, reindeer camp, film making, curling, massage, skiing, soccer; and you have to take a deep breath before you continue the list: pipeline readiness, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, injury prevention, Don’t be a butthead, STDs, suicide prevention, career talks, street life and many more, all geared to “build a healthy teen”. Here are some moments captured during 3 day conference.

D eejay!

Brandon Roland gets his chance to be a DJ. He scratched out some pretty funky beats with the help of Ihuman reps! The Ihuman reps did something very important, they reminded everyone that hip hop = music = love. “It was really cool, it got us really excited and made us think twice…hip hop is about more than drugs!” said Dolly Loreen from Tuktotyaktuk.

Hip Hop!

Tanya Snowshoe,

“It was fun. I liked seeing the dancing. And I really appreciated the suicide prevention component.”

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Vanessa Anikina, Sachs Harbour

“I really liked the RCMP role reversal. We also went to Don’t be a Butthead, Traditional Storytelling, and I learnt how to breakdance. This is the 4th time I’ve been to a youth conference.”