The Cortes Island Academy offers an accredited 20 week experimental, project-based education to local students in grades 10 through 12. They just wrapped up their fourth year and, on February 9, are about to start taking applications for 2026-2027. In this morning’s interview Executive Director Manda Aufochs Gillespie talks about the school and their recent annual showcase in Mansons hall.
She explained, “It was an incredible display, not just by the students of the Academy, but by the community who came out in droves to be the most supportive, engaged, and encouraging audience I have ever experienced. It was truly heartwarming to see the relational aspects of what was happening there.”
The students read a number of books this year, including Is a River Alive? by Robert Macfarlane, which looks at the idea of personhood and why many of us recognize things as ‘alive’ but do not grant them rights. They also read Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being.
“The showcase, and much of the year, were imbued with themes of water, time, personhood, and how these concepts relate to one another.”
“When you entered the showcase that evening, guests were held at the beginning and then sent down a ‘river’ that meandered along the side of the hall. The entire space was transformed to feel like a river, with students playing music, art on display, and quotes from their texts lining the path.”
The path eventually opened into an ‘estuary’ in the Pioneer Room. There were sub-areas for watching films produced by students, or listening to feature-length podcasts. There were reading stations to learn about the Cortes Island Academy in the media, read student essays, or view the books and papers they engaged with. This year featured even more student art. The room was made lovely with the help of neighbors like Caliani and Dancing Wolf, who provided lights and tapestries to make the estuary feel like a truly different space.
From the estuary, the path led into the main part of the hall, which was initially set up in a listening style. There was a gallery for student watercolours and a station for a group collage. Guests could create their own ‘message in a bottle’ inspired by the evening’s themes.
Manda Aufochs Gillespie: “There was a whole bunch of amazing food as well: tuna tartar, shrimp and sushi.”
The audience listened to short podcasts created by students. These were audio ‘messages in a bottle’ inspired by Ruth Ozeki’s work, dealing with the relationship between the writer and the reader, and how we send and receive messages through time. The students also utilized ‘biosonification’ in these projects. Artist Ruby Singh worked with them using devices that translate electrical impulses from nature—trees, mushrooms, or even groups of people—into sound. The students recorded these sounds and used them as ambient backgrounds for their podcasts and films.”
“The highlight of the evening was a performance art piece titled The Roof is Underwater, inspired by a New York installation called The Roof is on Fire. After the chairs were cleared, students brought in kayaks, canoes, and floaty devices. In the darkened hall, they sat in their vessels with round lamps and life jackets, engaging in serious conversations about their lived experiences. The audience was riveted for the full half-hour. Following the showcase, we celebrated with an appreciation and graduation moment. It was a wonderful way to display the variety of work our students do, from deep philosophy and essay writing to producing podcasts that are currently airing on Cortes Community Radio. I hope people tune in at 1:00 PM on Fridays at cortesradio.ca during the Folk U time or visit Cortes Currents to hear previous episodes.”
“As always, students also engaged in science and outdoor education. This year we introduced a new program where older students worked with middle schoolers from the Cortes Island School and the Homalco First Nation on weekend trips focused on language, culture, and outdoor exploration. This ‘North Salish Connect’ program, led by Tayler, helps students practice the skills needed to become future leaders.”
While the Academy is for grades 10 through 12, this partnership allows it to mentor younger students (grades 7-9) as well.
There were 14 students this past year.
“We always wanted the Academy to be a choice and not a mandate for students. We wanted the Academy to make education feel relevant and fun to young people, and we’ve always wanted to be something that would attract students from elsewhere as well as serve the needs of our students. Our students being those from the rural and remote islands all around Cortes and Cortes itself. I think we have done that.”
“The Cortes Island Academy starts in the Fall along with the rest of the schools, runs five months and ends in January. Instead of getting four classes worth of credits, our students get six classes worth of credits because they’re doing after school programming weekend trips. They go late many days. They go until eight o’clock. Even when we’re not doing outdoor education, they have these mentoring programs on the weekends and they do the radio shows after school.”
Students finish the remainder of their school year at Carihi High in Campbell River, or go to a different school district, or online with School District 72.
“This year the school district brought back their online learning model for high school students. They can stay enrolled with us and do online learning that we help support by getting some tutors etc through the academy and the local school program.”
This is the second year that students graduated with their full Dogwood certification without leaving the island.
“We are four years in and continue to listen to the diverse needs of students from rural and remote communities to create educational pathways that work for them.”
The Academy is in the midst of a fundraising drive. The support they receive from the school district covers about a fifth of the $3,500 per student it costs to run the program.
“We’ve never once collected that full fee from any student because we are absolutely committed to never turning away a student because of financial need.”
Instead, they give bursaries to students.
“That means that we are constantly in fundraising mode, not just for our bursary program, but to make sure that we can hire local facilitators and bring in these artists, scientists, thinkers and cultural leaders from all over.”
“So we’re always in fundraising mode and also we’ve never been unable to achieve our dreams in some way because our community continues to show up, volunteer their time, and get paid maybe less than they could be somewhere else.”
“I just feel like so grateful to this community. I never want there to be this idea that our community is on the hook financially, because there’s so many other ways to also be involved. Like just coming when we say the students are showcasing something or being willing to be interviewed for their podcast. We’ve never had a person say no to these student journalists sticking a microphone in their face and saying, ‘Hey, will you give me time?’”
“That being said, sometimes people do have a little bit of money – even if it’s $10, or maybe it’s thousands of dollars – this is one way that it can go and have immediate and direct impact to continuing to take our students through what we feel like is the best education ever.”
“For any of those who are curious about the Cortes Island Academy, we have a lot of fun stuff on our website, Cortes Island academy.ca, including films, podcasts, their radio show called Teen Takeover that they do on CKTZ. We have maps of the bio region that they’ve contributed to, and species that they have been tracking on Cortes. We have the overview of what each of our different semesters has looked like.”
The Academy partners with Hollyhock and Homalco to put on an intensive leadership summit for high school age students every year. CASE will be in May.
“Students who are not in the Cortes Island Academy can come and taste what the Cortes Island Academy is all about. So if you’re listening to this and you’re like, ‘whoa, I really would like to know more,’ maybe the CASE is a way to have a lived experience of it. We welcome groups from other school districts into that week long camp summit.”
The Academy also has a mailing list to help parents who intend to enroll their kids when they get older, members of the community, or students who have already graduated, keep track of what is going on and any upcoming opportunities.
“Drum roll: Monday, our applications for the 2026- 2027 school year semester go live. So if you have a young person that you think is right for the academy, we hope that you’ll have them apply. We have homestay options for them. So if they’re coming from another community but this is the right place for them, that is also arranged. We also will have bursaries, to help make sure that we don’t have to say ‘no’ to any of the students who get into the program for 2026 and 2027.”
If you want to enrol in the Cortes Academy, or make a donation to help it keep going, go to https://cortesislandacademy.ca/. There are ‘Apply Now’ and ‘Donate’ tabs in the top navigation bar.
Links of Interest:
- Cortes Island Academy website
- Articles about, or mentioning, the Cortes Island Academy
- Teen Takeover
All photos and video clips courtesy Chris Henry and the Cortes Island Academy
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