Home page

Text size

E-mail this page

QAUSUITTUQ/RESOLUTE - This summer Sharon Kalluk is getting her hands dirty.

Kalluk, 19, is helping to dig up historic Thule houses just outside the community of Resolute. She is working with researchers who work with the Polar Continental Shelf Program, a federal government program celebrating its 50th anniversary. Polar Shelf provides ground and air support services to as many as 140 different projects each year, including many university researchers and government agencies.

"It's my first time working with researchers," said Kalluk, who has been on the job for three weeks. "It's a lot better than I expected. It's a lot more fun and I didn't expect to learn this much over a short period of time."

Kalluk works with Sarah Hazell from McGill University on the Thule project.

Kalluk uses a trowel to carefully dig up old bones, puts them in bags and marks the trench numbers, and then brings them back to the lab to enter data onto the computers. Kalluk will be working on the site until Aug. 9, and already she has started to understand the basics, learning about soil levels and mapping. She has been given support and guidance from the researchers and the experience has sparked an interest in archeology.

"I think this is the most interesting thing I've ever done," she said.

Researchers often hire people from the communities to help them with their work.

"Certainly in the last several decades we've had full time staff from Resolute, Inuit people who worked with us in various forms and functions," said Polar Shelf director Martin Bergmann, adding that currently there are two Inuit working directly with Polar Shelf.

Researchers who work with Polar Shelf may also rely on expertise available in Resolute and other communities. Bergmann said several Rangers have been hired to assist researchers in the field with jobs including polar bear monitors.

"They're encouraged to hire out of the community," said Bergmann. "It's seasonal or part-time opportunities that we're trying to do more and more of."

In 1958, the Polar Continental Shelf Project was created to research the geology and the landmass of Canada's High Arctic mountains. The project has evolved into a program providing logistical support and though its formal name remains, Bergmann prefers to refer to the program as Polar Shelf.

Resolute was chosen as the base for Polar Shelf right from the beginning because it was a strategic point from which researchers could go to other areas in the North.

Polar Shelf assists with a wide range of research including anthropology, social science, space physics and understanding glacial retreat.

"There's not a lot of organizations that last 50 years in the North to begin with," said Bergmann, adding that it is also the International Polar Year. "Here we are around the world trying to focus on science in the Arctic and the Antarctic. You can't do that science unless you have a safe and proper (way) for researchers to go out to those areas."

To mark the 50th anniversary, the Polar Shelf hosted an open house in Resolute on July 12. About 70 community members out of a population of about 250 took part in the celebrations. The day included radio and GPS system displays, presentations and tours of the Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker Louis St. Laurent.

"A lot of the young people in town are genuinely interested in opportunities to learn about their land as well. It's a mutually beneficial situation because science is all about discovery and nobody's better at discovery than Northern people who have such an affinity to their land," said Bergmann.