Hi, my name is Keira. I am 17 years old and I am from Cambridge Bay, NU. I am apart of the NYA 2024 Canadian program, my buddy is Josephina from Clyde River and we are located in Campbell River, BC. We are loving the Island, it is absolutely beautiful. I applied for the 2023 Canadian program and got accepted as an alternate, I did enough work to gain a spot in the 2024 Canadian program. Originally I wasn’t sure if I was going to accept because I like to spend the summers on the land, I am happy that I chose to come down to do this NYA program instead of going camping lol.

I was able to meet a lot of cool, new friends, explore new places and experience things I never have. From the moment Josephina and I came to Campbell River, we’ve been going on road trips all over the island with our host auntie Debora and our host cousin Joshua! We went to the Nanaimo mall, explored beautiful Victoria, Port Alberni, Tofino, we even went to Long Beach!

It’s great to try new things, now I have life long friends and memories. It got super hard going into the 2nd week of being in my host community because I miss my home but I am still pushing through. My work placement was at little fry daycare, but it didn’t work out for me while being there. So now I am at the restore habitat for humanity.

I am grateful for this experience and want to thank everyone who has supported me, helped me with my assignments and most of all Nya staff members for being patient with me and all the other participants. I also got to see a few family members here on the island, I haven’t seen them for about a decade, so it’s great! Couldn’t have done it without my mentor Tiffany Picketts, so a huge thank you to her!