Achievement

Our IGERT collaborated with the International Arctic Research Center to teach a two-week field course in "Global-to-Local Interactions: Social-Ecological Resilience in a Rapidly Changing North", the theme of our IGERT program. In addition to two of our incoming IGERT trainees, the course attracted graduate students in the natural and social sciences from across the circumpolar North. The course explored issues of rapid change, resilience, and sustainability in the context of Alaska's interior and arctic regions, with a particular emphasis on industrial development and rural subsistence cultures and economies. The course visited research sites in the boreal forest and tundra, the Prudhoe Bay oil field, and the indigenous village of Anaktuvuk Pass. The course focused on developing skills to do interdisciplinary inquiry to understand the dynamics of social-ecological systems and succeeded in building a network of young scholars who share an interest in high latitudes sustainability.