Læra News
The Læra Institute invites all UArctic member institutions to contribute to our work. Contributions can be as simple as using our educational resources in Circumpolar Studies programmes, or taking part in our opportunities for dialogue between faculty and students teaching and learning about the Circumpolar world. We are also happy to hear from UArctic faculty or students with views or suggestions about our work, or about Circumpolar Studies generally.
Some UArctic member institutions may wish get involved more directly with the Læra Institute by affiliating with us. Læra affiliated institutions will make a material contribution to the work of the Læra Institute, such as:
- Adding teaching materials to our bank of pedagogical resources
- Developing and sharing exemplar courses in Circumpolar Studies that meet our curriculum criteria
- Hosting one of our faculty workshops or student symposia
- Funding or part-funding any elements of our work
If you would like to explore affiliation with the Læra Institute, please do not hesitate to contact us.
Heather Nicol (Academic Co-Director)
Heather Nicol is Professor of Geography and Director of the School for the Study of Canada at Trent University in Canada, where she coordinates the Circumpolar Studies Diploma. She is the author of many articles and books exploring the political geography of the Circumpolar North, with a specific focus on the North American Arctic and Canada-US cross-border relations. In 2015-16 she was a Fulbright Scholar and Visiting Fulbright Chair to the Center for Canadian Studies and Henry M Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. For further details, please see Dr Nicol's Trent University faculty profile.
Gary Wilson (Academic Co-Director)
Gary N Wilson is Professor of Political Science, and Coordinator of the Northern Studies Program, at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) in Canada. His research explores issues relating to governance and politics in the Circumpolar North, with a particular focus on comparative Inuit governance in the Canadian Arctic. He has served as the President of the Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies, and as a Council Member for the International Arctic Social Sciences Association. For further details, please see Dr Wilson's UNBC faculty profile.
Anthony Speca (Managing Director)
Anthony Speca is Adjunct Professor at Trent University in Canada, and Honorary Lecturer at the University of East Anglia in the UK. He was formerly a senior policy official with the Government of Nunavut in the Canadian Arctic. Through his educational consultancy Polar Aspect, he designs and manages Model Arctic Council (MAC) experiential learning events for universities, as well as the world's only MACs for secondary schools. He is especially interested in Arctic 'philosophical geography', particularly the ethical issues surrounding how we think, teach and make policy about the region. For further details, please see Dr Speca's professional biography.
Michel Beaulieu
Michel S Beaulieu is Associate Vice-Provost Academic, Director of the Community Zone and Professor of History at Lakehead University in Canada. He previously chaired Lakehead's Department of History and coordinated its Interdisciplinary Program in Northern Studies. He is also a Docent of Social Science History at the University of Helsinki, and a Docent of Modern North American History at the University of Oulu. He has been involved with UArctic Circumpolar Studies for over a decade, teaching courses, and updating and reforming curricula. For further details, please see Dr Beaulieu's Lakehead University faculty profile.
Douglas Causey
Douglas Causey is Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Alaska Anchorage in the USA, Arctic Fellow of the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center, Global Fellow of the Wilson Center, and Principal Investigator at the US Department of Homeland Security's Arctic Domain Awareness Center of Excellence. He offers several courses with the UArctic Circumpolar Studies programme, including 'Arctic Environmental Security'. He and his students conduct field research across the North American Arctic, particularly on questions of climate change and environmental security. For further details, please see Dr Causey's professional biography.
Astri Dankertsen
Astri Dankertsen is Associate Professor of Social Sciences, and Head of Division for Research on Environment, International Relations, the Arctic and Security, at Nord University in Norway. A sociologist by training, her research has been mostly concerned with Sámi and Indigenous issues, youth, gender and communities in the Arctic, and she teaches courses in both Circumpolar Studies and Sociology. She a member of the Council of Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, and she is also the leader of Sálto sámesiebrre, the local Sámi association in Salten, Norway. For further details, please see Dr Dankertsen's Nord faculty profile.
Amanda Graham
Amanda Graham is the Chair of the School of Liberal Arts at Yukon University, a founding member of UArctic. She has been enthusiastic advocate of Circumpolar Studies for more than twenty years, and she has taught UArctic's 'Introduction to the Circumpolar North' online course since piloting its initial delivery in 2001. She was involved in the early work to imagine the UArctic Circumpolar Studies programme, and she hopes to contribute to its future through the work of the Laera Institute. For further details, please see Ms Graham's Yukon University faculty profile.
The Læra Institute invites all UArctic member institutions to become involved in our work. Please contact us if you would like to explore how to become a Læra affiliated institution.
The Læra Institute is managed by a Steering Committee drawn from faculty teaching at the following UArctic member institutions:
- Trent University, Canada (co-lead)
- University of Northern British Columbia, Canada (co-lead)
- Arctic State Agrotechnological University, Russia (partnership suspended)
- Lakehead University, Canada
- Nord University, Norway
- University of Alaska Anchorage, USA
- Yukon University, Canada
Læra Institute pedagogical resources will comprise supplementary Circumpolar Studies teaching resources that are ready for faculty to use or adapt. We especially encourage UArctic member faculty to affiliate with the Læra Institute and share their best Circumpolar Studies teaching resources with colleagues. All such resources will be properly attributed to their creators.
Pedagogical resources shared with us for the benefit of other UArctic member faculty include the following:
- Circumpolar Studies: Enhancing collaborative curriculum development (managed by Prof Heather Nicol, Trent University).
In addition, you might also wish to browse the learning resources available from UArctic. Thank you for your interest!
Læra Institute exemplar courses are ‘off-the-shelf’ Circumpolar Studies courses meeting our Circumpolar Studies Curriculum Development principles, and designed for UArctic member faculty who wish to teach or modify pre-written material. Our exemplar courses will prove especially useful for UArctic member faculty developing Circumpolar Studies programmes for the first time, and who might benefit from the opportunity to build on an existing base.
Our current suite of exemplar courses includes the following:
- Climate change and the Circumpolar world (developed by Dr Tara Stehelin, School of Science, Yukon University)
- Representations of the Circumpolar North in literature, film and popular culture (developed by Dr Drew Lyness, School of Liberal Arts, Yukon University)
In addition to these courses, UArctic member faculty seeking pre-existing Circumpolar Studies courses may wish to explore the UArctic's original Circumpolar Studies core curriculum.
The Læra Institute has prepared a curriculum development guide for UArctic member faculty who are developing, re-developing, enhancing or reviewing an undergraduate curriculum focused on the study of the Circumpolar North. UArctic and many of its members call such a curriculum ‘Circumpolar Studies’, but it sometimes also goes by the name ‘Arctic Studies’ or ‘Northern Studies’.
Our purpose is not to dictate a set of criteria for curriculum developers to follow. Rather, we offer a set of guiding principles to support them in developing curricula that address the Circumpolar North in all its diversity, and that facilitate meaningful learning outcomes.
We are therefore less concerned with identifying and enumerating specific topics of study, than with setting out a general approach to Circumpolar Studies curriculum development. Our starting points are the UArctic’s existing core Circumpolar Studies curriculum, which is designed to enable broad knowledge and understanding of the lands, peoples and critical issues of the Circumpolar North, as well as the UArctic’s core values as expressed in the UArctic’s academic endorsement principles:
- Circumpolar: operating across different regions of the North
- Inclusive: respecting multiple systems of knowledge
- Reciprocal: promoting multidisciplinary understanding
By supporting UArctic member faculty in this way, our curriculum development guide aims to strengthen existing UArctic academic standards, and to reinvigorate the connections between a UArctic-wide academic community of educators and students.
UArctic itself also offers various pathways through which members can collaborate on educational goals or pursue larger educational projects. These pathways include affiliation with the Læra Institute, strategic partnerships with other members or member consortia already offering Circumpolar Studies curricula, and the UArctic academic endorsement process leading to inclusion in the UArctic Study Catalogue.
Our curriculum development guide is a living document. We shall keep it under review, and we shall update it from time to time as the Circumpolar North—as well as our understanding of the region—changes.
Download a copy of 'Circumpolar Studies Curriculum Development (Version 1.0)' published in August 2022.
The heart of the Læra Institute's work is the provision of educational resources to support UArctic member faculty teaching Circumpolar Studies. We aim to develop resources that enable high-quality teaching across UArctic as a whole, but without compromising local adaptability and academic flexibility. Rather than provide fixed modules or courses, we offer a set of criteria for designing best-practice programmes in Circumpolar Studies, complemented by exemplar materials and pedagogical resources:
- Curriculum development — a detailed guidebook for the development of high-quality Circumpolar Studies curricula, including curriculum principles, themes and learning outcomes, as well as a curriculum developer's checklist
- Exemplar courses — an ‘off-the-shelf’ suite of Circumpolar Studies courses meeting the curriculum criteria above, for UArctic member faculty who wish to teach or modify pre-written material
- Pedagogical resources — supplementary Circumpolar Studies teaching resources that are ready for faculty to use or adapt
The UArctic Læra Institute for Circumpolar Education was established in 2020 to support and strengthen UArctic member capacity to deliver locally appropriate and pedagogically high-quality Circumpolar Studies programmes, without compromising their own academic flexibility.
The Læra Institute will renew and revitalise the UArctic Circumpolar Studies programme, not by updating centrally planned curricula, but by developing and maintaining best-practice educational resources for Circumpolar Studies. The Læra Institute will also help to knit UArctic together as a borderless academic community by hosting workshops for UArctic faculty on Circumpolar Studies teaching and pedagogical innovation, and by convening student symposia for UArctic students studying the Circumpolar world.
About our work
The Læra Institute will provide a shared structure for UArctic members’ current local and independent delivery of Circumpolar Studies programmes by developing and offering a new and collaborative ‘best-practice baseline’ for Circumpolar Studies teaching and learning. This baseline will be expressly designed to strengthen individual UArctic member capacity to offer locally appropriate and pedagogically high-quality Circumpolar Studies programs of their own. It will consist of a set of curriculum principles, exemplar courses and pedagogical resources to assist UArctic members to develop individually tailored Circumpolar Studies programs and courses, to obtain UArctic endorsement for them, and to provide UArctic completion certificates for their students.
Building on this baseline, the Læra Institute will also support UArctic members to develop local Circumpolar Studies curricula, adopt pedagogical benchmarks and best practices, and foster faculty and student dialogue. The Læra Institute will create guidelines, templates and themes for course syllabi and degree curricula, and host faculty workshops and student symposia supporting innovative teaching and learning. The Læra Institute will also assist in maintaining common platforms to encourage delivery of online Circumpolar Studies curricula for UArctic members.
In these ways, the Læra Institute will help to foster a broader field of teaching and learning experience, and pedagogical best-practice, upon which UArctic faculty and students could draw. By setting a UArctic-wide pedagogical standard in Circumpolar Studies, as well as by organizing regular opportunities for dialogue, the Læra Institute will help to strengthen the UArctic as a borderless academic community of educators and students.
The Læra Institute is very grateful to UiT The Arctic University of Norway and the Norwegian Ministry for Education and Research for funding for this work.
About Circumpolar Studies
Circumpolar Studies is by definition an interdisciplinary field that explores the global Arctic region from a number of different perspectives, including the social sciences, the humanities, the natural sciences and the arts. It brings together scholarly perspectives from educators, researchers, practitioners and Indigenous knowledge holders who live and work throughout the Circumpolar North. The result is a comprehensive study of lands and environments, peoples and places, cultures and languages, and political and economic systems. This holistic approach permits us to understand how the Circumpolar North is connected by common environments, experiences and identities.
Contemporary research, teaching and learning in Circumpolar Studies does not promote abstract conceptions of the Circumpolar North, but rather strives to see the region from the perspective of its inhabitants. Its curriculum reflects a diversity of viewpoints and and sensitivity to context. It develops an appreciation for the connections between people and place, the impacts of globalisation and colonialism, the challenges of climate change, and the interplay between Indigenous knowledge and Western science. This rich and situated knowledge breaks down disciplinary barriers, inviting students, educators and researchers to understand the Circumpolar North as a unique place that is both a lived-in homeland and an emerging global region undergoing rapid change.
