And So, Don't go out on here.

Don't go on here. So Dr. Maria Williams, can you please introduce yourself and tell us where you're calling in from?

Yes, my name is Maria Williams. My clinket name is Sean Plau. I was born and raised in Ticotnew or Anchorage, Alaska and I am a professor in Alaska

in Alaska Native Studies and music here at the University of Alaska Anchorage, but I did of

studies and music here, the University of Alaska Anchorage. But I did teach at the University of

New Mexico for about 11 or 12 years and for two years I also taught at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe.

So I did live in New Mexico for about almost 20 years and in 2011 I was offered a job here at the University of Alaska, Anchorage, and then came home.

So that's where I am now.

And some of the, or just to give a background for people, you and I had first met actually at the last oil symposium, which was held here at the University of New Mexico.

And you gave a really amazing presentation I felt like about the environmental kind of struggles that Alaska natives are facing,

but also the relationship often complicated tenuous between the oil and gas industry and

indigenous communities in the north. So you know Alaska is a place. And if it were an independent country, it would be in the top 20 in terms of like the largest landmass.

It is also home to more than 200 mostly remote native communities and state roads do not

connect these geographically isolated communities oftentimes people have to

travel by snow machine barge or plane.

And like many reservations in the lower 48,

down here, many villages don't have access to running water making like CDC guidelines

currently you know for the COVID-19 pandemic to wash one's hands constantly a near impossibility.

And many villages are overcrowded or have housing shortages,

making physical distancing difficult.

There's also limited internet access,

which all makes online teaching as you and I both

...