Recruiting Inuit Teachers in Nunavut

• In Event: Education in the North: Challenges in Formal Education for Indigenous Peoples in Circumpolar Regions

Abstract

This paper describes participatory research on Inuit teacher recruitment in 11 communities in Nunavut, Canada. It answers the questions: "How do Inuit high school students view teaching as a possible career? What barriers prevent them from pursuing teaching? Can high school students' interest in teaching be raised by a face-to-face interview about teaching?"

With only a 25% graduation rate (Stevenson, 2007), schooling in Nunavut must be improved. Since the imposition of schooling in the 1950s, the curriculum, pedagogy, and deep structures have all been EuroCanadian (Berger, Møller, & Epp, 2006). Cultural difference theorists (e.g., Cummins, 2001; Philips, 1993) and meta-analyses from around the world (Castagno & Brayboy, 2008; Osborne, 1996) conclude that for Indigenous and minority students to thrive, culturally relevant curriculum and pedagogy are needed and communities must feel ownership of schooling. With Inuit comprising only 26% of Nunavut's teachers (Aylward, 2007), increasing the number of Inuit teachers in Nunavut schools is essential to meet these goals.

Inuit teachers in Nunavut are educated in the Nunavut Teacher Education Program at Nunavut Arctic College. The program is undersubscribed and Nunavut faces a severe shortage of Inuit teachers (T. Berger, 2006). Nunavut needs to more than double the number to meet the Government of Nunavut's (2008) goal of transforming schooling to a bilingual and bicultural system (Aarluk Consulting, 2005).

This research employed a participatory methodology (Kral & Idlout, 2006; Tester, 2006) where a university-based principal investigator worked with six co-researchers who were students in the Nunavut Teacher Education Program. A critical case study (Creswell, 2002; Thomas, 1993), it aimed to explore high school students' attitudes about, and increase their interest in, teaching. More than 130 semi-structured interviews were conducted by the co-researchers in nine Nunavut communities. Interviews were transcribed by the co-researchers. Data were coded iteratively (Agar, 1996) after co-researchers entered all transcripts into an online survey that gathered similar questions.

Half of the participants had thought of teaching as a possible career. Academic preparation, however, concerned many. Housing and money concerned those who would need to move to a different community to study. Two-thirds of participants said that no one had ever talked to them about teaching. Two-thirds said that they did not have enough information to apply to the Nunavut Teacher Education Program. Three-quarters said they would think more about teaching because of the interview, and half said they would like to teach upper grades that they cannot prepare for in Nunavut.

This research contributes to the sparse literature on recruiting Indigenous people to professions (e.g., Aarluk Consulting, 2009; Curran et al. 2008) and has policy implications for the Government of Nunavut, Nunavut Arctic College and other bodies interested in such recruiting. For instance, we recommend a predictable rotation of the teacher education program to the smaller communities, expansion of the program to educate teachers for the upper grades, and more information delivered to students in person, especially by Inuit teachers and teacher education students.

Author

• Paul Berger, Lakehead University