Ottawa (Feb 16/04) - Cold weather was not one of the challenges the students of Akitsiraq Law School expected to face when they came to study in Ottawa in January.

Day after day of -40 C temperatures plus a wind chill that battered central Canada for most of the month, however, meant enduring temperatures bitterly cold even by Arctic standards.

"Bone-chilling," is how law student Madeleine Redfern described the weather. She shared her observations during Akitsiraq Law School's intensive three-week study program at the University of Ottawa faculty of law.

The opportunity to study at U of O is another chapter in the remarkable legal education program under way in Iqaluit since 2001. This recent door opened in part through the efforts and interest of Bruce Feldthusen, dean of common law in Ottawa, who taught in Iqaluit during the summer of 1996 in the Jump Start program. This was a precursor to the Akitsiraq program.

"I knew it was very important that the Inuit have their own law school in the North," he said. "I also knew it was part of the original design of the law school that they have some exposure to southern legal education, but chances for the students to be able to uproot from Nunavut for a full semester were slim."

He said that's why the three-week format was adopted.

"I thought it was a perfect solution to extend our hospitality, and to give University of Ottawa students and faculty the benefit of their presence here," he said.

As one of 13 Inuit students working toward their law degree at Arctic College in Iqaluit, Redfern said there will be pressure with her degree when she graduates from Akitsiraq Law School in 2005. Currently, Nunavut's only Inuk lawyer is premier Paul Oklalik.

The projection is to eventually have the Nunavut government staff complement at 85 per cent Inuit.

"Thirteen lawyers is just not going to do it," said Feldthusen.

Already a group of accomplished individuals and community leaders, the Akitsiraq Law School is made up of students ranging in age from 25 to 48 from across Nunavut.

They have a wide variety of backgrounds. Among them, a former RCMP constable, a sealskin fashion designer (who is also a single mother of five), and filmmaker and educator Elisapee Karotek.

Akitsiraq means "to strike out disharmony and wrongdoing and to render justice," in the Inuktitut language. It is also the name of a sacred, secret place near Cape Dorset marked by a circle of large stones where the Inuit Great Council met to resolve disputes.

The name also aptly reflects the cultural divide students cross every day in the classrooms as they work to integrate traditional Inuit ways of meting out justice with the Canadian legal system.

While law courses in Iqaluit are taught primarily by visiting professors from a number of Canadian law schools, the program has benefited from the participation of Lucien Ukaliannuk, a respected elder from Iglulik, as Elder-in-Residence.

As essential as their legal training, the students take courses in the Inuktitut language, traditional law and culture as well as workshops in subjects such as the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement.

Although plans from the outset have been to run only one class through the Akitsiraq Law School, Feldthusen is not convinced it will end in 2005.

"There has to be another program or some variant of Akitsiraq Law School in the future and I hope that the University of Ottawa Law School can be involved in some way," he said.