Writing
is
exploring
I
The students of Gray School campus deliver
a new literary magazine for the community
n the fall of 2014, I met Alexa
Knutsen, lead teacher of Astoria
High School’s alternative school
located in the old Robert Gray
School overlooking Youngs Bay.
Alexa and I discussed the idea
of me visiting her Gray School
campus students and teaching a
Zeekly non¿ction Zriting Zork-
shop to supplement the school’s
online English instruction. She wanted addi-
tional writing opportunities for her students,
particularly if they called for personal explo-
ration and reÀection.
Astoria High School
Principal Lynn Jackson
allocated resources to sup-
port my efforts and gave
me complete freedom to
work with a student pop-
ulation that often suffered
signi¿cant imposed and
self-imposed barriers to
educational success.
The workshops were
non¿ction and thematic in nature, covering
such topics as Faces, Time, Dreams, Paths.
The students responded to my face-to-face,
interactive approach and produced outstand-
ing, searing and wholly original writing that
deeply impressed me. I wanted to hear more of
their stories, a lot more, and that surprised me.
Here I was, almost a quarter century into
my secondary teaching career, having read
millions of words of student writing, and I
thought I had heard it all from young people.
I was wrong. There is always something new
to learn from young people — if you listen.
My wish to learn more came true for the
2015-16 school year when I assumed all writ-
ing instruction duties at Gray. A month into
the semester, after reading dozens of essays,
memoirs and cultural critiques, I felt these
pieces needed to reach a wider audience than
one teacher. Astoria needed to hear them. I
thought, why not produce a magazine with the
students to get them out?
I pitched the idea to Alexa and Rachel Rol-
lins, the school counselor, and they agreed.
Principal Jackson approved, and Godfather’s
Books and Espresso in Astoria donated the
money to print the publication, which we
named Alternative Overcast.
Having advised publications such as Alter-
native Overcast, I know some people in the
communities they originate from don’t want
to hear what youth have
to say — whether it be
questioning the existence
of God, examining the re-
lationship to their home-
town, or reÀecting on past
transgressions.
I guess I’ll never un-
derstand this “I don’t want
to know” impulse. My
response to it has always
been the same: “Why?
What is there possibly to fear? The more we
know about our youth, the better we help
them.”
Writing is exploring, asking questions, try-
ing to ¿gure things out.
In Alternative Overcast, Gray School stu-
dents are doing exactly that with remarkable
candor, originality, humor and a special lens
trained on the vastness and minutiae of pop
culture. Join them on their journey and sup-
port. You won’t be disappointed.
The Gray School magazine is free and avail-
able at the following locations: Gray School,
Godfather’s Books and Espresso, Three Cups
Coffee, Street 14 Cafe, Fort George Brewery,
Coffee Girl, Downtown Coffee Shop, Astoria
Co-op Grocery, Astoria Coffeehouse & Bistro,
Seaside Coffee House and Jupiter’s Books.
There is always
something new to
learn from young
people — if you listen.
Submitted photo
Alternative Overcast is the new literary magazine produced by students at Astoria High School’s Gray School Campus Alter-
native Education Program.
An excerpt from
‘To Take on The World’
an essay in Alternative Overcast
By AHS student ALLISON McMILLAN
To tell you about the worst moment
in my life, I have to prove the severity of
how bad it was by telling you what all
didn’t make the cut for the worst.
It wasn’t when my mom would
leave for months to party with
random people on a reservation. It
wasn’t when my parents got di-
vorced. It wasn’t when my mom had
us pack up everything after she got
in a fight with our dad or when she
made us leave our pets there.
It wasn’t when we lived in a trailer
with little to no insulation during
winters where it snowed so much
we practically had to dig our way out
every morning.
It wasn’t when we didn’t have wa-
ter and had to walk three miles to the
closest water pump in the four to six
feet of snow. It wasn’t when we had
to do that in the scorching summer
hoping to God a rattlesnake wouldn’t
bite one of us on the way…
the arts
VISUAL ARTS • LITERATURE • THEATER • MUSIC & MORE
Story by MATT LOVE
March 31, 2016 | coastweekend.com | 9