Image provided by: The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs; Warm Springs, OR
About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (May 19, 1978)
MAY 1», 1978 PAGE 3 —— — Student Poet Selected For Seminar — ------- - ELIZABETH WOODY GRANDFATHER (GHOST) YOUNG INDIAN WOMAN LISTENING For M adras High School senior Liz Woody, going back to school this sum m er w ill be an honor and not a chore. Liz will be one of twelve students attend ing a five-day workshop at Lewis and Clark College in late June — an opportunity provided by the Oregon Arts Foundation. The sem in ar, which will give students a chance to work with two published wrjters, was the prize offered in a statewide crea tiv e w riting com petition held last month for all high school students in Oregon. Liz submitted three poems at the la st m inute and was genuinely surprised to receive word of her selection a few weeks later. Believing that com petition shouldn’t be part of writing, the talented young writ er entered because of the unique opportunity to work with pro fessionals of such caliber. T eaching the sem in ar will be n ovelist and poet Jam es Welch, a Blackfoot-Gros Ventre Indian best known for his novel Winter in the Blood; and poet Sandra McPherson who has ap peared in several leading maga zines and journals as well as her own books. Both are experienced teachers with whom students w ill be a b le to sh are their own work and explore directions in contemporary literature. Liz is taking with her to the workshop a sen sitiv ity to her cultural background that has found exp ression through the years in story-telling, drawing and more recently poetry. In two of the three works entered in the compétition, Liz addresses herself to her Indian background. “ Still I Can R e member the Brown Stone Color of My Skin” describes the poet’s re-awakening to the fact and the beauty of being an Indian. “Grandfather (Ghost)’’, which is printed here, was inspired by L iz’s own grandfather Louie P itt, Sr., but also contains her observations of two younger men. Liz’s family looms large in her future — “I plan to live with my fam ily a lot off and on and help them out," she said of her post-graduation plans. But she has m any other id eas about what lies ahead. Law is a field she would like to pursue, per haps at the paralegal level. And art school is a very rea l p ossi bility for the multi-talented stu dent who won first prize at the 1976 Oregon State F air for a black and white photograph. Acknowledging the difficulty of living off her poetic abilities, Liz said she nevertheless would feel sh e w as “ ch ea tin g ” if she didn’t continue to w rite and share her poetry with people. Besides, she noted, you “don’t plan on being a poet — it.just happens.” The ability Liz has discover ed and cultivated with the sup port of her English teacher Mr. Carlson and the feedback of her m other and friend s, should prove to be handy no m atter what she chooses to do. “My writing’s always going to help m e,” she predicted. “I’ll be writing all the tim e.” Plus there is the notion that “generally a poet or writer can talk people into th in g s.” Liz admitted to having the knack. And yet Liz didn’t need to talk her way into the sum m er sem inar with its free tuition, room and board. She sim ply wrote from her heart and wrote well. Silent, tall man walking among the melting people - Watching the longness' of your attractive walk, Your feet beat softly, and the hairs of your head rub sweetly. Gazing admiration of which you can not see . . . Your transparency allows me to think of you clearly - Your words are mellowed through your throat, Your lips create a slight drawl. When you speak . . . I strain my body to reach them . . . your words . . Your power seeps into mine and we feel strong. Reach you I try . .-. Too young am I. A man with children, A woman with many births around her. A man with strength . . . there are hardly any left. The scarcity of my fellow man-people shivers my soul. Your human softness leaves behind the boiling body of human kind. This thunders in my ears, and softly travels to my heart. ELIZABETH WOODY Madras High News . . Students Benefit From OTIS Madras High School “struck it rich” when they acquired an Oregon Total Information Sys tem, better known as “OTIS” , at the beginning of the school year. OTIS, is a term in al worth $40,000 which is used for both student purposes and adm ini strative purposes alike. The ter minal is hooked up to the main com puter, which is located in Eugene, by telephone line. The term inal can ca ll upon the computer at any time. The administration used the com puter for keeping attend ance records and scheduling classes. Attendance records can be stored in the computer to be pulled out at any tim e if a problem arises. The computer also works out the scheduling a year ahead. If one class appears to be overloaded, the computer will even it out. Students b enefit from this computer as well. Math teacher, Jack Gallagher uses it in math - teaching Computer Program ming. They work out problems on the com puter and check to see if they are correct. But learning computer pro gramming can’t be all that hard, especially if the computer can teach the student just that. The computer has a tutor program and can do anything from teach ing a child the alphabet to teaching a student how to write poetry or stories. Students can also play educational gam es on the computer. “Not gam es in a sen se that you play at h om e,” commented Gus Roberts,Librar ian at Madras High School. The gam es are one you learn by, su ch -a s, g a m es-d ea lin g with Chemistry, etc. OTIS also has a Career Information System. This sys tem has every known occupation in Oregon, and in a m atter of minutes, a student can find out working conditions, salary, job outlook fringe benefits, and even where that job might be located. Or if the student isn ’t c e r tain what career he is going to pursue he g o es through the “Quest Program.” The student an sw ers 24 questions and the computer will tell what kind of job is suitable for him. After entertaining students at the Petersburg School, Warm Springs kids visited classrooms and answered questions. Group leader and community liaison Delson Suppah told one class about the traditional language of the Warm Springs visitors. CDS Photo Children at the rural Petersburg School outside of The Dalles enjoyed watching Warm Springs kids do such traditional dances as the Butterfly Dance (above), Skip Dance, Owl Dance, and War Dance. Then joinedtheir visitors in a snaking Circle Dance. The cultural exchange trip was one of severai made by* local students this year, , , . . ............. /.''' . , i ."’. ’CDSPhoto
