Iditarod: Teacher on the Trail brings Iditarod to Ohio
Fresh out of graduate school, Jim Deprez got a job as a substitute teacher. One of the lessons he was asked to cover for this second-grade class was on the Iditarod, and he saw the kids get hooked. Ever since, he said, he’s been turning what was once a two-week lesson into two months of interdisciplinary learning. The kids love it, and “I’m always learning more,” said Deprez, now a 3rd grade teacher in Hilliard, Ohio.
Deprez has been teaching about the Iditarod for 15 years and has been the Teacher on the Trail for two years. The program, which started in 1999, brings a Lower 48 educator to Alaska for the race, and the teacher reports from the trail. Deprez writes two or three Iditarod-themed posts a month during the year, and then daily blog posts during the race. In his first year, he wrote about “Moments with Mushers,” learning about – and sharing – the history and the changes that have happened over time. He has covered “Misconceptions and More,” helping people figure out the details, such as the difference between the Widow’s Lamp and the Red Lantern, or why the trail starts in Seward.
This year, he has focused on the volunteers, sharing behind-thescenes stories of the people who make the race happen. “Without the volunteers, this race would not happen,” he said. Deprez has spoken with trail breakers, checkers, veterinarians, the Iditarod Air Force, race judges, photographers, search and rescue, and more. Every time, at the bottom of one of his posts, which can be found online at the Iditarod Education page, he leaves a lesson idea for teachers following the race. “That’s been really cool to have that interaction with teachers from all over the country, especially during the race. Lots of teachers have reached out and asked questions,” he said.
After two years of COVID and the Iditarod, Deprez will be handing off the ceremonial sleeping bag to another, yet-to-be-determined, teacher at the Iditarod Summer Educator Conference, which happens around musher sign-ups and the volunteer picnic. In the summer of 2020, there was no handoff, and one day he found that a duffel bag had arrived in the mail for him. To save teachers from having to go out and purchase everything new every year, he explained, the duffel contains a sleeping bag, a head lamp, a selfie stick, wifi hotspot, air mattress, and other essentials for teachers on trails.
His successor hasn’t been announced yet, but he already has advice for them: “Get out and do as much as possible!” Many of the opportunities he had were because he was walking around. For example, he was out for a walk and bumped into Barbara Moore, Red Lantern winner of 1980, who arranged for him to experience a dog sled ride. At the chute he saw Aliy Zirkle, who said that 2022 was her easiest ever trip to Nome. “So many cool little tidbits and amazing little stories! Get out, experience everything, do as much as possible, and take advantage of every minute out here,” Deprez said.
Deprez’s lessons to his students over the last 15 years have been a big hit. One of his students even hooked up the family pug, Chubs, to lead a line of stuffed animals, pretending that they were mushing. “The kids love it!” he said.
Just as all the fans had been glued to the tracker, Deprez’s family back home was, too. During the race, his wife sent him a picture of their 10year-old explaining how the tracker works to their 5-year-old and grandfather. “It is a generational thing, and now they’re a lot more interested. It just takes that initial spark and then it spreads,” Deprez explained.
“I wish the EDU part would spread even further to help spread Iditarod to everybody because it’s so unique,” he said. While teaching during COVID has opened up such opportunities as virtual field trips to Denali to learn about sled dogs, it is getting harder for teachers to get permission to take the time off to follow the race. Schools and school districts are trending towards using test scores as a metric, taking Iditarod innovations out of the curriculum.
But Deprez says that the Iditarod can be used to teach many of the subjects which students end up being tested on, and not just geography or history. He explained that at his school, they have programmable robots called Ozobots, which follow lines. Deprez makes a large copy of the Iditarod map, then asks students to write code based on what mushers might actually do along the trail. “Going up Rainy Pass, they might have the bot slow down because it’s slow climbing up the mountain and then coming down Dalzell, they might have it go really fast. There’s a pause for three seconds if the musher is doing their 24-hour layover. The kids love to do the zigzag going across the Bering Sea ice, slipping. They get really creative about what the Bot can do at certain points of the race based on what actually does happen, which is pretty cool. There’s so much out there that you can do,” he said.
“Iditarod is so naturally integrated into everything that it’s not forced, it’s a natural way to help teach these standards. Then it develops that passion with the kids, and for me, that’s the ultimate goal,” he said.
The Teacher on the Trail program started in 1998/99 after Andrea Aufder-Heyde, known as Finney, a second-grade teacher in Bloomington, Indiana, approached the Iditarod about her idea for it, explained Director of Education Jane Holmes. Holmes, who was herself once a Teacher on the Trail, said “We’ve never had a teacher from Alaska on the trail, and we would love to have one!”