Re-imagining Nunavut teacher education: A document analysis of Indigenous teacher education programs

Abstract

Within Nunavut, the Nunavut Teacher Education Program has continually failed to sufficiently supply the territory with an adequate number of qualified Inuit teachers necessary to deliver quality Inuit education that is rooted in language and culture. For the Government of Nunavut to meet the demands of providing Inuit-led education, the program needs to be revamped. Over the past 50 years, the program has evolved from a colonial, southern-led teacher education program, to locally envisioned community-based programs and then back again to a more colonial program that aligns with southern partnerships. Each revamp seems to move the Nunavut Teacher Education Program further away from the decolonization process that needs to occur in order to ensure that its graduates have the necessary qualities and skills to create cultural sustainability within the territory. Keeping decolonising methodologies, such as tribal critical race theory and Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit, in mind I used document analysis to examine other Indigenous teacher education programs from Canada and around the world. Four Canadian and international Indigenous teacher education programs were examined based on pre-determined guiding questions to ascertain their ability to be transferred to Nunavut’s remote, northern setting. After examining these four programs, that were felt to be the most promising, I found that while each program has its own strengths, no one program seemed wholly transferable to the Nunavut context. In fact, for the Nunavut Teacher Education to move forward in creating a program that would increase Inuit teaching capacity within the territory, a combination of the strengths of these four programs would likely produce the best result.