Nunavut Law Program, Akitsiraq Law Program, or Akitsiraq Law School is a special legal education program designed to increase the number of lawyers in Nunavut and the Canadian Arctic. Unlike traditional law schools, Akitsiraq has been offered only through limited intakes rather than as a permanent institution. The first cohort (Akitsiraq I) ran in partnership with the University of Victoria from 2001 to 2005, and a second intake (Nunavut Law Program) was launched in 2017 with the University of Saskatchewan. Graduates of the program receive the same law degree (Juris Doctor or Bachelor of Laws, depending on the degree offered at the time by the partner university) as students attending the partner institution. A proposal for a new cohort in partnership with the University of Ottawa was made for a planned 2011 start, but it did not proceed due to lack of funding from the territorial government.

The program was primarily delivered in Iqaluit in partnership with the Nunavut Arctic College.

The Law School has no permanent classrooms, employees or assets, and the admissions process has no formal education requirements. The Akitsiraq Law School focuses on the practical abilities of potential students based on life experience and work history. The program is strongly supported by legal professionals and by members of the Nunavut Judiciary through in-kind and volunteer services, developing effective programs and bringing legal resources from across Canada to teach each Akitsiraq cohort.

Akitsiraq programs have provided legal training to residents of Nunavut and the surrounding Arctic region, leading to professional and para-professional legal qualifications. The Akitsiraq Law School Society is a not-for-profit organization incorporated in Nunavut. Its board of directors and membership are drawn from the Nunavut judiciary, legal profession and supporting members of the public, along with nominees of supporting agencies.

The cohort-based, culture-enhancing, learning-in-Nunavut format of the Akitsiraq Law Program has frequently been promoted as a prototype for training in other professions including accounting and education administration.

History

Despite the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement specifying that employment in the newly created Nunavut should be representative of the territory's demographics, people of Inuit descent were absent from the legal field. In the mid-1990s, six Inuit law students who had gone to the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law had all dropped out, isolated and short of money so far south.

A program to train law students in the north gained support. A University of Victoria student working in Iqaluit on a co-op program, persuaded her school join Akitsiraq as its law school partner. to residents of Nunavut and the surrounding Arctic region. This program accepted one intake of students in 2001-02 who graduated in 2004-05. The Akitsiraq I final report Lawyer Making in the Arctic ( [July 2007] Browne, Crawford and Tulloch), is an extensive record of this program, and includes seven appendices incorporating contracts, course selections, timetables, budgets and program evaluation by graduates.

A planned Akitsiraq II program was announced by the parent society in conjunction with the University of Ottawa Law Faculty, using infrastructure and support from Nunavut Arctic College. The announced intention is to proceed with a second cohort of students in 2011. The recruiting and admission process for the 2011 cohort have been funded by Justice Canada, including Akitsiraq Law Days in Cambridge Bay, Rankin Inlet, Iqaluit and Ottawa in the spring of 2010, but the program launch has been on hold since November 2009 awaiting a decision by the Government of Nunavut to provide core support. It did not go through after the Nunavut government declined to provide the funding.

In June 2015, Nellie Kusugak, the Commissioner of Nunavut, promised a return of the Akitsiraq program in her commissioner's address. In September 2017, the new program launched in cooperation with the University of Saskatchewan College of Law.

Curriculum

Akitsiraq operates on a cohort model. Students are admitted in distinct cohorts, forming strong supportive units which learn and live together over the four years of the program. Only one cohort is in process at any time, with students moving together through the initial years and into the more advanced studies, relying on teaching from temporarily assigned professors from the judiciary, southern Canadian Universities, and the legal profession at large. In this way resources can be secured and opportunities developed appropriate to the cohort at each point in their learning and consistent with the small population based from which they are drawn.

The program for Akitsiraq I was taught as a modified law curriculum. The focus in the first year was to ensure academic success for the students. The University of Victoria Faculty of Law developed a Legal Research and Writing Course, which included an enhanced study skills component. The first year also exposed students to contract, criminal law and Legal Processes courses. As of June 2009 nine of eleven graduates have been called to practise. This is consistent with or exceeds success rates in southern Canadian university law programs.

Madeleine Redfern, one of the graduates became the first Inuk selected to article as a clerk at the Supreme Court of Canada, under Mme Justice Louise Charron.

See also

  • Higher education in Nunavut

References

  • Akitsiraq Law School
  • [http://communications.uvic.ca/releases/release.php?display=back&id=70]
  • University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law - Akitsiraq II Law Program
  • Arctic College