Akitsiraq Law School

[citation needed] The Akitsiraq Law School focuses on the practical abilities of potential students based on life experience and work history.

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[1] and education administration.

[3] Critics opposed spending a million dollars per year on eleven law students when the territory was also short on other professionals such as doctors and teachers.

These four-year programs deliver the equivalent of a Canadian three-year law degree for students in this isolated region and in a strongly Inuit cultural context.

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.

[5] 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.

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.

The University of Victoria Faculty of Law developed a Legal Research and Writing Course, which included an enhanced study skills component.

In addition, Akitsiraq II students will have the opportunity to participate with their contemporaries at the University of Ottawa Common Law Faculty each year in the intensive three week January intersession.

The introductory program anticipated for June–July 2011, is designed to orient students to the study of law, identify skill areas where additional support will be focused in the early program years, and provide a broad introduction to the classic first year study areas, as well as an initial exposure to the interface between Inuit Law and the Canadian legal tradition.

Student financial support was based on salaried sponsorships through various agencies including the Government of Nunavut, the Department of Justice, and several not for profit Inuit organizations.

Student funding incorporated a requirements for attendance and post-graduation commitments to remain in their territory or province of origin (most were from Nunavut) and work for a minimum of two or four years following graduation.

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.