Sámegillii
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Article in the book Sami school history 1. Davvi Girji 2005.
In the beginning of the 1950s Ivar Skotte was one of the
few in Polmak who owned his own car. |
Ivar Skotte was teaching at Polmak school from 1951 to
1953 in what at
the time was Polmak commune, now a part of Tana commune. He was
born in Lesja in Oppland in 1927, did the upper secondary school exam in Molde
in 1948 and the teacher's test in Volda 1951.
After Ivar Skotte left Polmak he has completed further education in physical education, pedagogics, English and agriculture. He has worked in elementary schools in Skien and at Fron in Gudbrandsdalen. |
I graduated the student line at Volda teacher's college in 1951. During the last half year there were lots of talk about where we'd like to apply for a job. After 14 years of school we were very motivated to start working - and to earn money. I was completely sure where I'd like to work - in the north of the country, in Finnmark. I had read a lot about the evacuation and burning of that part of the country that took place in the autumn and winter of 1944.
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| The boys and the girls on a skiing trip. (Photo: Ivar Skotte) |
The boys: Idar Sørgård, ?, ?, Erling
Pettersen, ?,?. The girls: Margit Alette Somby (Anti), Eli Rajala, ?, Marit Johansen, Randi Bertram (Helander), Aslaug Varsi, Eila Andersen. (Let us know if you know more names.) |
The boarding school was an impressive building. With its three floors on a high foundation wall it really stood out in the landscape. The house was finished in 1938 and had survived both the war and the burning in 1944. There weren't any electricity in the village, but the boarding school had its own generator named Sakkeus. I don't know why. In the room next to the generator there was a room with accumulators. The system was made for the generator to charge the batteries. When they were fully charged we would have enough electricity for the classrooms, the dormitories and for the other rooms in the house, but not for cooking and heating. I soon realized that the maintenance of Sakkeus and the accumulators would be one of the main tasks in my position as manager of the boarding school.
The buildings were more than 15 years old, and quite run-down. There shouldn't be spent money on anything, because the village was waiting for electricity. Kraftlaget (an electricity company) had already started setting up poles both for high-voltage and energy distribution network. The boarding school had a system of central heating, which could be heated both with firewood and coke. When we heated with firewood I had to get up at a certain time during the night to fill the stove, otherwise there would be no hot water in the morning, and cold dormitories and classrooms. Coke was transported to the school when the ice on the river Tana was solid.
People from the neighborhood were hired to chop firewood and do other kinds of work that could be dangerous. The pupils had the responsibility to pile the firewood and make sure there were always enough firewood in the kitchen and in the boiler room. I can't remember whether there were problems linked to this job. As in any other home it was natural that the children helped out with odd jobs. I was used to this from back home in the farm where I grew up.
We were one teacher short just before the school started. The school council made the superintendent of schools aware that there was a young person in the village who spoke Sami and who would like to be a teacher in the school. He was a student with a couple of years experience as a teacher. But the superintendent of schools turned down the proposition. And a young female student from Oslo arrived a few days later. She had just finished her upper secondary school exam in the spring, and didn't speak any Sami of course. This shows how the school politics in the Sami area was in those days. All teaching should be held in Norwegian.
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17th of May was among other things celebrated with a potato
race. (Poto: Ivar Skotte) |
Quite a few of the youngest pupils understood little of the teaching. The situation was a little bit better in the upper primary school (4th to 7th grade), but also among those pupils there lacked a lot in the comprehension of Norwegian. And it was the same for the adult segment of the population. A self-experienced story sheds light on this: The school board decided unanimous that sexual education should be given in the 7th grade. I was to teach the boys, while the oldest of the female teachers would teach the girls. We had gotten hold of the illustration charts which were to be used. I had gotten an introduction to the subject in the teachers college. We made a straightforward plan for the teaching together, and were of the opinion that we had done an acceptable piece of work. But after some time we learned that there was a petition circling in the village to stop this teaching. One day I met one of the people who had signed - who also was a member of the school board - and I asked him why he had signed. Was it our way of teaching the subject which was the problem? No, he answered. They just didn't understand the expression sexual education.
The Sami ABC-book of Margarethe Wiig wasn't put out until in the 50s. In the beginning of the book the Sami text was on the first page, followed by the Norwegian on the facing page. The two languages had different colours. Later in the book the two languages appeared on the same page, and became less separated. And in the end of the books there were coherent texts in Sami and Norwegian, but still divided by colours. I know that the book has been published in several editions. And I suppose it is a sign that Sami should be used as an auxiliary language.
The hygiene was an important part of the job. One afternoon every week we had bathing day with sauna and shower. I was responsible for the boys, meanwhile the housekeepers were to help the girls. After the bath all the pupils had to go through a scrutiny of the hair in order to discover lice. Some students had gotten lice at home. The ones who had lice were given a sprinkle of DDT-powder in the hair and in the underwear. The bedlinnen were also sprinkled with this powder. We got loads of 10 kilos at a time from the pharmacy in Vadsø. Now it's completely prohibited to use DDT in any kind of situation, but at the time it was an effective remedy against lice. I can still recall the particular smell of this powder. We sensed it everywhere in the house. At that time I was the most visited hairdresser in the village. The boys should have an "american" haircut. They didn't quite know what it implied, but I showed them pictures of american soldiers which were quite close-cropped. The girls had long hair, which could be problematic. When they combed their hair a lot of hair ended up in the sink and blocked the drain. For this reason, and also for hygienic reasons, we encouraged the girls to have shorter hair, but they weren't too keen on the idea.
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Proud girls are posing in self-sown clothes at the end of
the handicrafts course 1952. Back row: Inger Marie Olsen (Munkebye), Sigrid Johnsen (Eriksen), Signe (Andersen) Pedersen, Sara (Pettersen) Johansen, Marit Eriksen, Kari Sagen. Front row: Inger Andersen (Dervola), Inga Johansen, Liv Pedersen, Anna Helander, Káre Risten (Solveig) Trosten (Pettersen) (Photo: Ivar Skotte) |
There were a lot of governmental boarding schools in Finnmark. All of them had a housekeeper who were responsible for the food and the food budget. It was a matter of honor to them to run the boarding school with as low costs as possible. The superintendent of schools made sure we all got to know the diet cost per pupil per day. And the one who was able to run at the lowest cost was praised. This could give comic outcomes: We were four adults and a child who were staying in the boarding school over Christmas. I thought we could buy some Christmas sweets, like we were used to. But the house keeper said no - it would make the food budget rise too much. Instead I placed the extra expenses for the Christmas sweets on the maintenance budget which I was responsible for.
The daily diet was simple. The pupils ate a lot, and seldom complained. There were still rations for a lot of foodstuffs, but we managed well. At times there was a lack of milk. There wasn't any delivery of milk to the dairy, and therefore the farmers didn't produce more than they would use for themselves. But we bought sacks of dry milk and made hot cocoa.
For breakfast we would eat sandwiches and drink milk or hot cocoa. And after the third lesson we would have the same meal. Dinner was served just after the school finished for the day. It consisted of soup or meat or fish in different variations. The pupils had to take cod liver oil in the winter months. It was always a big mess. So we came up with the idea of putting the bottle with cod liver oil on the dinner table, so the pupils could use the cod liver oil as "sauce" on the fish. It went well. And then we would eat a slice of bread or two before we started to do homework at five. The supper was served just after we had finished with the homework, it could for instance consist of reheated leftovers from dinner. The diet was simple, but it was also healthy and nutritious. And it has to be viewed in the light of the system of rations, the fact that the village didn't have any road and the limited economy. In the winter we bought a lot of reindeer meat. And in the summertime we got hold of cheap salmon from time to time. And generally we bought barrels of salted fish. Vegetables were difficult to get hold of. And that was possibly the greatest lack - at least for me.
The time between supper and bedtime was also a nice time for activities inside. We had a choir in the school. The pupils liked, and were also good at singing. They never brought radios. Very few homes had a radio in those days. We sang in the church during a funeral once. One of the pupils died in the period he was at home, and the parents wanted us to sing. It was a good way - also for the students - to say goodbye to a friend and schoolmate.
Between five and seven o'clock everyone had to do their homework. One of the teachers had to be present in order to keep order, and to help the ones who needed it. Everyone had to stay inside these two hours, and there were no exeptions. The ones who finished their homework early got other things to do. There were a lot of pupils who needed help. As far as I remember the older pupils were very good at helping the younger ones. In particular I recall a girl in the seventh grade who had two younger siblings in the boarding school. She was like a mother to them. And it could admittedly be needed. I vividly recall the crying of the first graders when they stood there alone after their parents had left. But luckily we had Sami maids who could talk to them in a language they understood. But what was it like to be teaching these children who didn't understand the language which was used for teaching? Quite a few pupils talked and understood both Norwegian and Sami. They were often used as translators. One had to make use of all the pedagogical remedies one knew. And it also happened that one had to make use of untraditional methods.
In the spring and the autumn we had a problem when the ice on the river Tana was unsafe to travel on. The village Polmak was on the opposite side of the river to the school and the boarding school. And during this times of the year the pupils from the village had to live in the boarding school. It was impossible to predict for how long we would be isolated. We had to keep plenty of food. We weren't able to go to the shop, post-office or the communal offices. When the ice was safe in the autumn, or when it had melted in the spring, life returned to normal again. It was a celebration for the whole district when the ice melted in the spring. It meant that they were able to take out the boats, and soon the salmon would come! In the school we were always eager to know if the river would be trafficable before the 17th of May letting the whole village community be able to celebrate the day together.
What did we adults do in our spare time? The district sheriff and his wife were interested in music, and they put together a kind of quartet. We took a lot of delight in it. The district sheriff himself played the accordion, mandolin and trumpet. His wife played the guitar. In addition the administrator at the cooperative shop played the accordion, and I played the guitar. We made our first appearance in the parade the 17th of May. As far as I remember we used to play at dances in private festivities. Otherwise there was a vivid bridge circle in the village. We were 16 players divided in four tables. I was a beginner in this field, but I had a patient and good partner. It was good fun and very social.
The position at the boarding school in Polmak was my first after completing my education. I didn't have the practical experience to handle the problems which could occur. Now, after more than 40 years of experience from 1rst to 10th grade, I'm able to see things in a different way. A boarding school was a new concept to me. I didn't see any other option either in a commune without roads. It was too far for the pupils to walk. I know that in some sparsely populated areas they made use of private accommodation. It was probably never an alternative in Polmak. I guess one should be allowed to say that a boarding school was the best solution in order to be able to give the children an approximately normal schooling.