 So the name of the program that we deliver here is the Environmental Technology Program. It's a two-year diploma program. It's delivered over 21 different courses, a total of 60 college credits. And the aim of the program and the goal of the program is to develop made in an innovative environment practitioners. The program's been running since 1987, so last year was actually our 30th anniversary. We have well over 150 graduates of the program now, and these graduates have found careers as environmental practitioners all across the world. Both in federal and territorial governments, but also private industry, in the organizations, institutions of public government that are described under the Land Claims Agreement. They're everywhere. And it's really great because the more alumni that we get that are out there working, we rely on them a lot as a program to come back in and teach for us in that. So they're a real strength of the program. So I don't really say we're a... I know the name sounds a little deceiving. It's called the Environmental Technology Program. Years ago, when our program was last reviewed, there was a suggestion to change the name of the program. And I was really dead against it because we have such strong alumni. And I felt that a different leaning program might make some of those alumni not feel so much a part of it. So we've kept the name. We are not the MIT of the North or the Caltech of the North, where we're not a pure technology type program. The students do learn about some technologies for sampling in northern conditions, especially in cold northern conditions. But I tell people we're more like a soft science type program. And the range of programs or the courses that we teach is really broad. So we do everything from applied math, very beginning, from the introductory ecology to fisheries and wildlife management marine biology, limnology, GIS, we have a GIS course, small engine repairs, survival skills on the land, a whole broad sort of selection of courses. And the idea is to do as much as we can for as many of the partners that hire our students. So, you know, again, when I talk to people what we do, we're trying to train for careers as environmental practitioners. And that's sort of a broad group, of course, of opportunities from being a wildlife officer, an environmental protection officer, a wildlife, sorry, a lands officer, technicians for their various institutions of public government. So it's sort of a broad spectrum. I tell people that after the two years, I don't know if the students are fully trained for any one position, but they're well-trained for a slew of positions. We run sort of a typical college format, classes start in September. The first semester ends before Christmas. We start our second semester in January, goes till the end of April. So two semesters per year, about 15 weeks per semester. The first thing we do in our program is students have their field camps. So they come back from the summer, and the first thing we do is we sort of pack up and go camping all together. First-year students, their field camp is more or less introductory field camp skills. So a lot of our students have camped and gone hunting their whole lives, but it's a little bit different when you're doing field camps with researchers and government organizations. There are certain protocols you have to follow and risk assessments you have to do. So we try to take them through that, how to plan, how to meal plan, how to purchase things, how to pack things when you get there, how to set up so the camp's going to be run safely. How do you balance chores between the camp members, stuff like that? So the field camp is a great way, especially for our new students, to sort of get to know each other. And it's a real benefit that our program has, I think over a lot of programs, is that in those first couple of weeks, our students bond in a way that is very difficult for other programs to bond. They also do their wilderness first-aid training, firearm, and firearms training at that time. Basically, to prepare them for all the other land trips we're going to do in field camps, we're going to do, it's important that our students have that wilderness first-aid training and firearm skills in case there's any issues with predators or animals. When they come back, we do an introductory ecology, specifically to northern tundra ecology, and then they go into things like math, communications, and another course called office procedures and management skills. For semesters, it gets off to a good start, but it's a difficult semester to get through, I think, for a lot of students. It's, in many cases, first year back in school. And so our goal is to get them through that first semester and remind them that the second semester gets more specific into work related to environmental studies and technologies in them. And yeah, we certainly had elders come out. This year we did invite somebody out, didn't quite work out. We do have our technician who is a local gentleman, lots of land experience and hunting skills, graduated the program from years ago. So he comes out sort of to fill that role. We have various people that come in and out of camp throughout the week. All three instructors here in our technician group, we also have usually a marine biologist from one of our partner agencies that have come out. We also have our wilderness first aid instructor come out. I don't think we've ever, I just think, I don't think a student has ever stayed back because we were unable to accommodate them. I can't. So we have the majority of the field gear for students, but we do ask students to have their basic clothing. It's ideal if they have their own sleeping bag and then toiletries, cutlery, things like that. But more or less all the cooking stuff, all the food, sleeping mats, foamy's, caribou skins, tents, all the fuel for the heaters and stoves, all that stuff is provided by the college. We do have stuff here for students who are unable to sort of get it one way or the other. I don't think we've ever had a student not come out of camp because we couldn't work with them. We've had one or two students who have lost 20 years not making it out to camp, something because they showed up today at camp and then told us they didn't have this stuff and we couldn't do anything. If they gave us advance notice, we've always been able to find them sleeping bags, clothes and stuff like that. Yeah, getting to know the students for sure. I think being in a field camp setting with students is a great, we're really fortunate as instructors because we get to see our students in a different light. We get to see how hard they can work when they need to work. We can see how they work under poor weather conditions because we always have bad weather all the way around at camp and how they respond to that. We can sort of pick up on those that are a little bit more outgoing and good at interacting with others and those that are shy and get to know the little ins and outs of their character and personality a little bit even maybe in their preferred teaching style or learning style. So I think just getting to know the students, people are asking you, what's the best part of your field camps? It's in the evenings playing cards and playing games and listening to them tell stories and jokes and the laughter. Our instructor tent is set up next to the large sort of communal tent and it's just great sometimes going to bed and you hear them laughing and laughing and just getting to know the students and getting to know that these are real people with complex lives just like you and I. Many of them have partners and kids and in fact I told all the instructors and they would back me up on this. I tell them it's very important for our students during this camp to get their wilderness first aid training because second most important and almost equally important is that they have a great time and they get to know each other and it's sort of like setting the hook and now they don't want to leave. Right now they'll put up with some of the courses that they're not so enthused about being here for like communications and office procedures but we sort of let them know there's another field camp coming up in April when the weather's nice and we have the skitties and there's snow. So we start and we end each of the two years over the course of the program we do four field camps two in the fall, two in the spring slash winter. Okay so our fall camps are I think probably typically late fall weather for a lot of southern Canadians where at night you might get a little bit of ice on the streams. It's cold, certainly goes below freezing. Up here it rains a lot or it can rain a lot. This year we had more snow than we've ever had and our field camps always take place the same week every year so it's not that we were late. We just had more snow. I think it snowed midway through the camp and that snow stuck around for the rest of the camp. So we had an unusual amount of snow. It's not typical. It always snows at least one day during the camp but usually it'll melt over the next two. So it's right around the freezing. Some years we get more sunny days than cloudy and rainy but a lot of years we get cloudy and rainy. So learning how to manage that and learning how to manage your attitude when the weather isn't so good is an important skill for our students too. Just learning to get along and not letting the weather dictate your mood and stuff like that. So I think there's a range of growth so some students coming here like the first couple of days I realize they're going to be a great graduate. They're a mature student, a disciplined student. They're going to not probably struggle too much throughout the program. They're going to be a great graduate. And then some students they come in and you can tell they're not necessarily right from high school but they're still young. Young in spirit maybe they haven't had the opportunities to develop certain I don't know parts of their character they're maybe not so independent or resourceful and it's those students who we often see and I think as an instructor I love seeing by the end how confident they start to get and they realize that they are a good learner that they're resourceful and the end of the program isn't necessarily the end of their either education or learning because they realize they have the tools and they have the skills to continue on as learners. So I love seeing that sort of maturity. I love hearing students saying my goodness I look at the work that the first years are doing and I think that was hard for me. And now look what I'm doing in my final semester look at some of the projects we're working on look at some of the courses and they get it. So there's that sort of awareness that they're really capable learners they've got that confidence to learn and I think one of the big words is resourcefulness they know they can if they don't know how to do something they're confident in their ability to learn it now. So I should give a little disclaimer I'm a graduate of the program and so a lot of the graduates in the program I end up being sort of close with because we're all alumni sort of friends we keep in touch I have no alumni list we keep in touch we're really fortunate a lot of our alumni when they're in town we'll visit the program and I've certainly heard phrases like life changing I've heard a number of our graduates say greatest choice and greatest decision in their life I changed their life changed the whole direction how much they love their careers how you know how grateful they are that there is a program like this around for them to take a program that gives them an education that leads them into careers where they're not just sitting in a cubicle they can go out on the land and interact with people in their communities interact with elders interact with researchers interact with other government people yeah they just I really get the sense that they love it and I know many of them have really exciting jobs you know working for some really great organizations on some really great projects from the new Canadian higher-tech research station over in Cambridge Bay we've had students go on work on icebreakers and research vessels and on glaciers we've had to work for most of the institutions of public government most of the Inuit orgs on great projects projects that need Inuit on them and leading them but not just Inuit but Inuit that can speak that the language that some of the proponents are talking and sharing and using and students that are educated enough to know what seems to be working what seems not to can sort of interact and talk with the researchers and some bureaucrats on a level that I think a lot of people who wouldn't take a science course like this would be able to so we just I just met with one last week actually we were in it was for a basically community consultations and oil and gas development in Nunavut and so they had QIA at it they had the old INAC or CERNAC was there QIA, CERNAC, Government of Nunavut ED&T was there and actually they had about ten different representatives from ten different levels of government three of them were graduates of the program and I think the only technical people only people there that had technical knowledge and were Inuit were the three graduates from our program so that was exciting for me to see the IRIS report release last I think it was Wednesday or Thursday night and one of the people hosting it another graduate of the program so our graduates are all over leading the way as environmental practitioners I think being great role models to younger kids realizing we can have these jobs in the future and we can do this for southerners that these are jobs that they can go to art college and get a diploma that will set them on a course where they can have careers these exciting areas I think one of the biggest challenges is just the level of education that the students come into so I think we've done a good job as a program communicating this to some of our employers and letting them know that we almost start in our program at square one we expect very few math skills I mean you have to have basic university for sure and almost zero science skills so we don't have students come in with the grade 11 and 12 academic science courses or grade 11 and 12 academic math courses so we realize that in many communities these courses aren't being offered so we try to accept strong students students that have shown strong academic skills and then do what we can as much as we can over the two years so that's how we're dealing with that obviously past historical traumas to people in the north are sadly plentiful and I think if you first come up here from the south as an educator you see people driving new skus and new boats and living in fancy houses and wearing whatever the fancy shoes are for the day and with their iPhones and I think all that stuff can hide from you the fact that there are still these traumas that are inter-generationally impacting up here for sure and I think those have caused a lot of students a lot of struggles I think caused issues regarding homesickness substance abuse issues just a lot that puts a lot I couldn't even fathom I've been in there for a long time I've written so many things and sometimes if I sit down and think about all the various things that have happened to the people up here over the last 150 years it's flipping overwhelming and it's very hard for us as instructors to truly understand on a day-to-day basis what our students go through and the things that they're dealing with dealing with them in their day-to-day lives but also dealing with an emotional and mental health basis too and we try to remind ourselves of that I try to remind the other instructors they try to remind me that the most important thing last night may not have been for them to answer the 20 questions that we gave them that they may have had some serious stuff happen at home and we need to understand that and really work with our students not make excuses for them but be a pathetic and accept where they're at and help them be a small part of that I don't know, I tell people this all the time too I don't know all the answers to some of the issues that are in it but I know part of it's education I don't know how big of a part it is but I truly believe that a good education can boost self-esteem help people and set them on a good career track and change lives I've seen it in students who come in here and I've seen their lives take off after the program I'm not saying it's just because of the program but the program's been a part of it for sure this is one of those questions where sometimes I feel if you want to know what indigenous education is I think we should let indigenous people to find that if you were to ask I mean, is indigenous education I think most people if you ask them just simply what it was they would say well it's teaching indigenous people about indigenous stuff their way of knowing the traditions the ecological knowledge but I think it can also mean for programs where that isn't the primary goal and that isn't the primary goal of our program I get a lot of people that apply in the springtime and they'll be like yeah, I want to take ETP because I really like hunting and I was like, you know, in my head I'm thinking well that's great that you enjoy hunting but we really don't have much in our program and it's like 1% of our program that's not really what we do it's I would be stretching it to say we are an indigenous education program I think though as an education program we have had many successes with indigenous men and women so I think there's something that works in the program where inuit men and women from Nunavut have done well in our program and they've enjoyed their time in the program so some of the things there that I think might cause that is that I think we're very open to our learners sharing any knowledge that they have and it could be knowledge of a very local nature it could be knowledge that they've read it could be knowledge that they've heard from you know their uncle Peter Lucy or something like that we really welcome in value these over the years we've gotten some really great little nuggets we also try our best to be very welcoming, accommodating, understanding I think one of the because I have certain little I call them couch passions things that I do are armchair passions one of the armchair passions I had even before I looked up here the Arctic and the history of the Arctic not so much the ecology of it but the people the traditions the exploration, the development of it the people of the Arctic right so how did the tunic get over here and how did the people why did the two leaf follow so long after and why were they so different very interesting last number of years with the influence of vitamins so I've always been really interested in this stuff and I think when I moved up here though I started hearing more of the colonial past I think having a really good understanding now I have a good book understanding I have no experiential stuff in this right but I have a really good book understanding how does that help it gives us a healthy sense of empathy and it certainly slows down your judgment of things that maybe don't seem quite right and I've heard this obviously I'm a white guy so other white people often speak freely to me not realizing that I'm not really where they're at and how they think these things and some of that stuff this is just really simple minded judgmental way too quick as you can tell they just they don't have a clue what's been going on here in the last 150 years so I think that helps me I think as an instructor I've had great bosses too supervisors I should probably say I hate it when I call them bosses here at the college that have worked here for years and years before I even came here and have given me really great learning points I guess one was when I first started teaching I wasn't teaching here in a small community up Island and I was like a week or two in and I was getting a little exasperated by the fact that my students weren't really showing up on time they didn't seem motivated to learn and I remember I was talking to my boss and I was explaining this to her and she goes do you realize Jason that for some of your learners just waking up and getting to your learning center and accomplishment for a lot of them that's where they're at just be glad that they come and when they're there do whatever you can don't worry about whether they're there full schedule time just do what you can some of those things that sort of set me I guess maybe set me straight in a different perspective a bit extremely helpful I didn't even know my students do it's just the other thing it's a small town regardless of what people say about the Caliwood for me it's still a small town and we bump into each other all the time in the community and it's important for the students to see me also as a member of the community it's important for me to me it's important that they see me with my wife and my children they see me doing other things and in the community I'm a community member they know not to ask me about homework I will never ask them about their homework they don't ask me and it's just sort of the importance of getting to know each other on a personal basis too and not just as a student I've heard people say well down south if you go to a big university you're just the number or something you hear this a lot that is totally not here about our students and of course there are some students that you care about more than others because quite frankly maybe they need more caring than others and some have good support of families here and just before you came I actually had one of the first years come and share something that's going on in this family and I was really grateful he did because now we'll get if there are some things where maybe he's not focused in class or maybe his assignments are a little bit delayed which is uncharacteristic behavior for him maybe we'll get it but it's nice to be able to get to know your students like that I'm going to give you a broader answer and then I'll focus on the program if you don't mind my broader answer would be this and that technology allows for the academic development of curriculum across the university so that there is more emphasis on the math and sciences not I don't think it's a game theory where if one area wins another area has to lose so the fact that we put more time into math and science does not mean that we put less in the language need to do language development and culture we've got to stop thinking that way but there are so many exciting careers that are completely lost to youth in this territory now because too often they're not given the very basics through the K-12 system to move forward in a math or science field those STEM areas of science, technology, engineering and math and those careers are going to be some of the most exciting careers now in the future I think they're going to be even more and I think a lot of those careers I think what's really exciting about them a lot of those careers don't need you to be in a specific place with technology and the internet video conferencing the way collaboration goes on in the world today you can actually have one of those careers sitting in Repulse Bay you can have one of those careers sitting in Kimmerwood or Clive River it's a decent internet you can do this stuff, you can do coding you can write things, you can collaborate in projects you can design, you can engineer and I hope none of it starts seeing the importance of those STEM areas and really starts pushing it because I think like I said our youth are sort of being lost to a lot of these and I don't see graduating with them and I know just from the students coming to our program there's a lot of work to be done there so that's overall in the program and this isn't just my vision this is the vision that the college has and I think it'll happen much quicker than the next 10 years I would say I would be shocked if this doesn't happen in the next three to five years I think the ETP program will continue to exist the reality is our program after two years has graduates go on to exciting careers and industry still needs ETP grads so ETP grads are still going to be needed but our industry partners are saying that there's other careers that currently can't be felt by ETP grads because they need a bit more training they need a degree say that's the minimum requirement so the college does have a short slash medium term plan to have a post diploma option for our graduates to go on to do a bachelor of science and that's what we're going to be starting work on very soon actually we've probably exchanged some information already moving in that direction but this year we should really be starting that process and I'm very hopeful in the next two to three maximum five years we will have a post diploma bachelor of science program that'll be delivered primarily here in Nunavut maybe not in this building maybe not in the Kelvin but that graduates of the program current graduates and past graduates all those alumni that we have if they wish continue their studies and get a degree, a science degree and so I'm really excited about that I'm also excited though to strengthen the program to continue to strengthen the environmental technology program I think as the technical skills of students coming in the program seem to be getting better and better we can strengthen our program more and more as population grows and our applicants grows in our program and we can be more selective and so to just up the program little by little I've said before and I think I think it's a pretty accurate statement that the academic skill level of my classmates back in 1996 isn't what I see in the students today in 2018 so that there's been the bar has been upped so that there's higher entry requirements or the typical incoming student is more academically skilled Is there anything else you would like to add? When I see the questions just so I hope that at this part helps I've brought on the ones that you discovered any questions? Thank you So a lot of your questions I noticed too were almost written more for indigenous educators so as you can tell I'm probably not an indigenous educator I don't know if we can ask this for you I mean like overall you are an educator and you have been for a long time so And I appreciate that but I also appreciate that both of you is completely different and although I wish I could understand certain things better and I think I try to and I try to reflect on this stuff I'm never going to have that shared life experiences that's on me of my own students I was fortunate early on Clara because I was supposed to teach in a different program here that was being developed at the college and we had a very wise dean at the main campus at the time and he says you know Jason the program might take about a year to get funding for and everything he was in the meantime though we're going to send you to a small community and you're going to learn what it's like to live in a small community and the environment that your students your future students are going to come from and I spent two years in the Black River just north of here on Baffin Island unbelievable experience and you wouldn't believe how many times that experience comes into my mind when I'm dealing with students and yeah I was really fortunate to have somebody give me that opportunity oh there was a question about success of the program where is it I don't see it here though so that's where I can brag a bit about the program we really do we have a lot of alumni and those alumni have been picked up by our industry partners they move up those corporate ladders they do extremely well we have had people from ADMs all the way down to wildlife officers sort of like the GM corporate ladder says you know how do you know the program is being successful as a two year program I don't think there's any program in college for a single delivery program that gets as many applicants as we do we get 40 to 60 a year our graduates most of them have jobs before they even graduate and the employers that hire them meet with us all the time and are asking us how do we get more how do we get more when you're only graduating maybe 6 to 12 a year and you have all these different agencies trying to get them they're competing for them so to me you can use all sorts of different measurements to measure the success of the program my success is the graduates grow on and speak well with the program employers speak well with our graduates and people keep applying huge numbers that's all for today is that all? just stop so we did