Jennifer Geens
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Apr 12/04) - One of the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre's Internet projects has been shortlisted for an international award.

"Lessons from the Land," a virtual journey along the Idaa trail, a traditional Dogrib route between Great Slave Lake and Great Bear Lake, is one of 12 finalists in the culture category for the Stockholm Challenge, a program that recognizes the benefits to society of information technology.

Other finalists in the culture category include the Egyptian government's interactive archaeological map of Egypt and the Web site for the Singapore National Archives.

"It raises the credibility of what we do here," said Charles Arnold, the director of the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre.

"There's so much stuff on the Web, this directs attention to what we've done here."

There are a total of six categories in the competition, including e-government, health, education, e-business and environment. There were 103 finalists chosen in all, out of 900 Web sites considered.

Lessons from the Land was developed by Heritage Centre staff using the research compiled by archaeologist Tom Andrews, who spent four summers travelling the trail.

The Web site took shape in 2001 with the help of the Dogrib Education Council and Yellowknife Smart Communities.

The Web site (www.lessonsfromtheland.ca) uses music, audio, video, photographs and text to communicate information about the Idaa trail and the Dogrib culture.

Staff from the Heritage Centre will travel to Sweden for the announcement of the winner on May 13.