Thoughts on Education, the Training of Arctic Scientists and Arctic Research - The Changing Arctic Environment: The Arctic Messenger - page 323

further review the feasibility of the proposal by undertaking consultations and to propose
options and plans for the next SAO session, scheduled for October 1997.
Canada and Finland, with the University of Lapland and the Circumpolar Universities
Association based in Rovaniemi, agreed to support a small international task force chaired
by Bill Heal to undertake the consultations and to prepare structural proposals for the uni-
versity. It was at this point that I began working with Outi Snellman of the University of
Lapland and Sally Ross of Yukon College (Canada). I met with Outi in Québec City prior
tothe10-13OctobermeetingoftheCircumpolar MinistersofEducationtoensurethemin-
isters could reassure the Arctic Council they were willing to back the initiative. I was able
to locate supportive funding for the task force.
At the October 1997 SAO meeting in Ottawa, the task force report “A University of
the Arctic: Turning Concept Into Reality” was well received by SAOs and a number of
them began to express interest in a possible announcement on the topic at the autumn 1998
ministerial conference of the Arctic Council. They requested that Canada, Norway and
Sweden askthe Circumpolar Universities Association tofurther develop the proposal inas-
sociation with the circumpolar permanent participant indigenous peoples' organisations. I
was charged with writing a “letter of invitation” to ask Outi Snellman and the Circumpolar
UniversitiesAssociationtoprepareafeasibilitystudyfortheUniversityoftheArctic.Iwas
also requested to include guidelines on content. I sent the letter by e-mail on 16 October
1997 and on the following day received an e-mail from Outi accepting the new assignment.
The task force was replaced by a working group of the Circumpolar Universities Associ-
ation, chaired by Professor Asgeir Brekke of the University of Tromso (Norway). Most of
the financial support I was able to organise from Canada went directly to Yukon College to
support meetings of the working group in Whitehorse.
The next step came with the presentation of a progress report from the working group
(made by Peter Johnson and Sally Ross) at a 9-11 May 1998 meeting of SAOs. At the
close of the meeting, Canadian SAO chair Mary Simon (the then-Canadian ambassador
for circumpolar affairs) remarked that the initiative could be a potential deliverable for the
Ministerial Conference in Iqaluit (Canada) on 17-18 September 1998. To make this a real-