Читать книгу Racing Toward Recovery. The Extraordinary Story of Alaska Musher Mike Williams Sr. онлайн

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It also offered more money than washing dishes. I had flexible time, too, not having to get up and start work in the kitchen at six o’clock in the morning.

The mental health program was the first in rural Alaska. It was an effort to come to grips with the issues that were affecting people. When I accepted the position I continued taking courses and Dr. Stillner ended up being one of my professors. I also took solo courses from him and he and his wife, Marianne (she was a psychiatric nurse who worked for the school district focusing on kids that had brain damage or developmental disabilities), joined my karate class and became my students.

When I took the mental health position it expanded my work with kids in the middle school. After a while Marianne Stillner asked me if I would be interested in using the karate instruction as a self-esteem and confidence builder for the kids that were brain damaged, had developmental disabilities, or didn’t have any role models. We took some of those kids, equipped them with karate uniforms, and I spent two hours of my work day teaching them karate. I also worked as a counselor working through the schools in building self-esteem within these kids. These were kids who weren’t doing well in the classroom and they had low selfesteem because of that or other reasons. After a year of doing that we found that these kids had improved their confidence and their grades. Everything improved for these kids.