ARVIAT/NUNAVUT - Joint funding between the federal and territorial governments promises to pay huge dividends for secondary and adult learning in Nunavut.

Federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq announced $4.9 million in infrastructure investments for Nunavut Arctic College (NAC) while in Arviat this past month.

The funding comes from the Knowledge Infrastructure Program, with the feds providing $2.2 million and the Government of Nunavut (GN) $2.76 million.

The money allows the GN to move forward with its Cyber Infrastructure Project, a fibre optic communication network that will make online learning and research accessible to all 25 Nunavut communities.

NAC plans to use the technological improvements to deliver more programs and courses in the communities.

Eric Corneau is the manager of technology services for the Nunavut Research Institute and is responsible for implementing the project.

He said its beauty is that it touches all of Nunavut.

"This will provide NAC with the cyber-infrastructure to be able to provide higher connectivity and distance learning," said Corneau.

"It's, really, a revamping of the entire college network throughout Nunavut."

Every NAC facility will have structured fibre-optic connectivity, which will mean running about 300 km of fibre-optic line from community learning centres (CLC) to the main network.

The project has to be completed by March of 2011.

Corneau said NAC is assessing a variety of courses to be integrated into the online learning platform and distance learning.

He sees computer science, basic college requirements, administration and other courses already part of NAC's curriculum offered through the project.

"We'll be more effective in our delivery and in providing more access to every community."

"The number one benefit is higher bandwidth, which brings with it the ability to search and have access to a more effective online system.

"The second big advantage will be the options of online and distance learning, which is something we'll have far more capacity to deliver once the setup is complete."

NAC president Dan Vandermeulen said it was the college's response to the Knowledge Infrastructure Program which made all this possible.

He said when the feds announced both university and college components, NAC developed the Cyber Infrastructure Project.

"We were looking for a project that wouldn't be restricted by the sealift cycle," said Vandermeulen.

"And we wanted it to have an impact on all 25 Nunavut communities, which this will.

"The project will improve our communications platform and connectivity in all our facilities, including every CLC.

"It's the necessary technological front-end that needs to be done before NAC can get seriously into the business of delivering courses right into people's home communities by distance."

Vandermeulen said once the two-way-communication link is open, NAC will be able to deliver more programming and people in the communities will be able to connect to more courses.

He said by offering a distance course to four or five communities, NAC will be able to attract enough students to make its delivery viable.

"That's one of the big strengths of distance learning in small, remote communities.

"You may only have one or two people interested in a program in a community, so you can't afford to go in and deliver it.

"But if you can bring them together with two or three people in other communities, pretty soon you have 12 to 15 people and then you can."

Vandermeulen said he sees the Fibre Infrastructure Project as an opportunity to add more learning options for Nunavummiut to choose from.

He said right now, someone living in a Kivalliq community such as Coral Harbour, for example, can study at their learning centre, but they can only choose from courses NAC delivers there through an adult educator.

"As distance learning grows, they can go to their CLC, look at a listing of programs and courses, and have a much wider choice over what they may take to advance their adult learning.

"In time, this will improve the general post-secondary and adult learning standards of the whole population.

"By giving more learning options, we enable people to open more doors to more different careers."