The UAA Seawolves hockey team will be playing the Mount Royal University Cougars at 7:07 p.m. on Oct. 2 at the Soldotna Sports Center. KPC students, staff and faculty who attend will receive free admission if they show their KPC ID card at the door.

Known as UAA on the Peninsula, KPC looks forward to sharing team spirit with the university hockey team.

Seawolf logo items are available in the KRC Bookstore, located in the McLane building. The public is encouraged to attend the exhibition game and cheer on the teams.

KPC adjunct professor publishes new book

Bill Howell, former director of KPC Student Services and current adjunct professor, recently published his fourth book about craft beer in Alaska. “Alaska Beer: Liquid Gold in the Land of the Midnight Sun,” is the result of Howell’s interest in the rich history of beer in Alaska. The book chronicles the evolution of beer into eras including the Early Days (1867-1918), Dry Spell (1918-1976), and Rebirth (1976-2014).

Howell will speak about his new book at a KPC Showcase presentation at 6:30 p.m., Oct. 8 in the McLane commons at KRC. Howell offers a course titled The Art and History of Brewing at KRC each spring semester.

He also writes a weekly blog called “Drinking on the Last Frontier” (alaskanbeer.blogspot.com) and provides a beer column for the Redoubt Reporter. Howell’s books are currently available at Amazon.com.

Kenai River Campus new faculty spotlight

John Messick, has been hired as KRC’s new term assistant professor of English and has replaced Dorothy Gray who retired at the end of the last academic year.

Messick holds a master’s of fine arts in non-fiction creative writing from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and a bachelor of arts in English and minor in sociology from the University of Missouri, Columbia.

Messick’s previous employment experience includes communication arts teacher at Lutie High School in Theodosia, Missouri, teaching assistant at UAF, wild-land firefighter in Arizona and Alaska, general assistant for Raytheon Polar Services in Antarctica, ESL teacher in South Korea, and as an office of experiential education facilitator and diversity peer educator at the University of Missouri.

This semester Messick teaches two sections each of fundamentals of oral communication and introduction to composition, and one section of writing in the social and natural sciences.

New textbook rental program to launch next semester

To help offset the rising costs of textbooks, the KRC Bookstore will offer students the opportunity to rent, rather than purchase books for their classes. In the past, if students needed to rent a book, they were forced to seek out an outside vendor. It is hoped that the new, on-campus rental option will be more convenient for students taking face-to-face courses and will allow them to avoid delivery delays and shipping costs.

For information on the rental program will work, contact Jenya Malakhova-Quartly at 262-0306 or email mevgenya@kpc.alaska.edu.

KRC professor launches new project

Continuing his life-work to help preserve and enrich the Dena’ina culture in Alaska, Alan Boraas, KRC professor of anthropology, has begun a new project that is being funded by the Lake Clark National Park Service. The project explores Dena’ina “deep or expressive” culture.

Boraas, along with twenty-two elders and culture bearers representing every Dena’ina village, met for three days at the abandoned Lake Clark village of Kijik to discuss aspects of Dena’ina thought and values. Some in the group said they had never heard some of the subject matter discussed before in a public setting. The culture awareness project will continue for several years.