TUKTOYAKTUK
For Rebecca Pokiak, going to work means returning to a very familiar place.

daughter Isabelle take part in a traditional dress contest during Tuktoyaktuk's Beluga Jamboree on April 15, 2012. Pokiak, who graduated from Mangilaluk School in 2002, now works there full time as an education assistant. - Rebecca Pokiak and her

Pokiak graduated from Mangilaluk School in Tuktoyaktuk in 2002. She began working as a substitute teacher at the school soon afterward and applied for a job as an education assistant about four years ago.

Now, Pokiak spends her workday in the halls and classrooms she once knew as a student.

Half of her day is spent working with the school's e-learning students, who participate in courses in Inuvik via video conference. Pokiak said her role is to assist with students' questions and facilitate their workloads.

"I'm there to support them and to help in any way I can if they have questions about the work they're doing," she said. "I send all their assignments to the teacher in Inuvik."

For the rest of the day, Pokiak is placed in elementary grade classes, helping with everything from art to math.

"I work with individual students, sometimes reading a book with them or taking them out and doing something one-on-one with them," she said.

She also helps teachers deliver lessons.

Pokiak said while her routine is constant, her day is never boring.

"It's different all the time," she said. "There is always something to keep me busy."

Pokiak said while she didn't attend post-secondary school to become an EA, she regularly participates in training workshops available to school staff. She said learning about more effective ways to assist students who are having problems is valuable.

"They open your eyes and make you look at things a different way," she said. "With difficult students, finding ways to get them back on the right track."

Pokiak said she knows how important it is for teachers to help keep students on the right track. She added that Janie Jones, a teacher at the school who taught her when she was a student, was instrumental in helping her achieve an education.

"I always said she was one of the people I looked up to that encouraged me," she said. "She was one of the main reasons I got my Grade 12, because of her words and her encouragement for me."

Jones now teaches Pokiak's son, who is in Grade 1 this year.

"She gets to see my son in school now," she said. "It's kind of neat."

Pokiak said she has been considering returning to school to further her own education and career.

"I enjoy it so much," she said. "There is really no reason not to continue and maybe try for being a teacher."

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