The goal of this project is to work with communities in the yukon river region to build capacity for localized fisheries research and management alongside enhancing data sovereignty through…

The goal of this project is to work with communities in the yukon river region to build capacity for localized fisheries research and management alongside enhancing data sovereignty through archiving fish health data collected in the region. The budget for this project will facilitate development of training materials and community visits. Project personnel will travel to communities such as the village of tanana to deliver skill sharing events in which high school students are trained in approaches to fisheries disease surveillance with a focus on ?squash preparations. Finally, this project budgets funds to digitize and permanently archive findings of previous disease surveillance efforts in the tanana and fort yukon regions so these data can be stored long-term and accessible to communities. Specific deliverables will include materials for skill-share learning events (labs) and provision of equipment for conducting squash preparations as needed to schools. This work is conducted with the hope that outcomes will include more localized fisheries data collection towards enhanced community involvement in research that informs future management decisions. Intended beneficiaries of project deliverables are varied, however we intend to focus initially on high school aged students to not only engage students in disease surveillance of their fisheries, but also expose students to a technique with applications across biological fields.