Schools On Board: We Finally Arrived!

Posted on October 2, 2011 by admin

September 24, 2011

Today was a great day, because we finally landed in Kugluktuk and got on board the Amundsen! The five students who met in Quebec City met the other 4 students today. We’ve learned to get along really well in such a short period of time.

One of the students needed to go back to Kugluktuk before getting on the ship, so I went with her and got to see a part of the town. Everything is so different! It’s a small community of 1,300 people, and everyone knows each other. The houses are built on supports in such a way that they are not touching the ground. The freezing and refreezing causes the soil to shift a lot, so they need to adapt their houses to the conditions. We drove by the hospital, the grocery store, the hotel, the arena, and the elementary and high schools. It’s not hard to tell that life in Kugluktuk is very different from Montreal, but I’ll find out much more once we get off the ship and spend a few days there.

We got to take a helicopter from the airport onto the ship. That was definitely the coolest thing I have ever done in my life. I can’t believe how much stuff there is on this ship. It never looked so big from the outside. The space is used effectively though, with narrow hallways and steep staircases. We’re free to go almost anywhere we want, and there’s so much to explore. We just went up on deck, and it’s actually really cold because of the wind. I’ve seen many instruments and scientific equipment and I’m really curious about how it all works.—Karen Butt ’12

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Grade 8 Experience Activity: Committed to Green and Creative Commons

Posted on September 27, 2011 by admin

The grade 8 students started the school year with an interesting project! During the first two full days at school, we worked on public service announcements (or PSAs) in groups of two or three. Each group’s video was to be presented at the end of the day on Friday, so you can imagine the rush we were in! On Thursday, each advisory headed to a different place. Some of the places include the Concordia Greenhouse, the NDG Eco-quartier, and the Animal Rescue network. Upon our arrival, we were assigned different tasks. My advisory visited the Concordia Greenhouse, and we did various jobs related to gardening: Harvesting and drying teas, thinning out the carrots, etc. Once we returned to school and ate lunch, we began our projects. Although the project didn’t have to tie in to the place our advisory visited, it would be to our advantage if we did so. We would have known more about the topic and possibly have obtained the necessary photographic material. Using the media we had gained from our trips or through the Internet, we began our hurried attempts to squeeze out the best work we possibly could in the short span of two days. The PSA had to fulfill many requirements, and my group’s goal was to make it as emotional as possible. The most difficult part was that a new concept was introduced to us: Only using the Creative Commons (or similar sites) for media, unless it was produced by us. We weren’t allowed to just search for any picture; it had to be licensed for re-usage! Thankfully, our group was spared this process since we provided all the media. By mid-morning on Friday, our video was finished. All in all, it was a lot of fun to work on this project that informed everyone on our chosen subject, and it was cool to watch what everyone else had produced!—Holly Faria ’15

En Route to Kugluktuk: An Unexpected Canadian Tour

Posted on September 26, 2011 by admin

September 21, 2011

I arrived in Quebec City today, and got to meet all the southern participants. It was a beautiful day and we spent the afternoon walking around the old part of the city. I’m getting really excited because I got to see a lot of pictures and videos taken by someone who’s been on the Amundsen many times. I’m blown away by all the things that there are to experience in the Arctic and I feel like there will never be enough time to embrace it all. I also got to glance through the on board schedule and I’m really looking forward to tomorrow when I get to enter an entirely different universe. I’m getting up in four hours to fly to Kugluktuk, and we get to board the ship once we arrive. I’m really looking forward to settling in and getting a tour of the ship. What comes after sounds so different and exciting that I can’t believe it’s real yet.

September 22, 2011

Today was a day where I reinforced some knowledge I already had by experiencing it in real life. No – I didn’t get to do any cool experiments on the Amundsen. What I learned today was that Canada is indeed a very large country. At 6 am I took off from Quebec City and after about three hours, the airplane stopped in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut for refueling. After an hour spent in an airport with only two gates, we took off to Kugluktuk and, as we were landing, we suddenly started gaining altitude again. A little later, the captain made an announcement that there was too much fog in Kugluktuk for us to land safely and that we were going to Yellowknife. This airport was a little more sophisticated: 5 gates, a café, and Internet access. After spending three hours there, we found out that we’ll only be able to get to Kugluktuk on Saturday morning. There weren’t enough available hotel rooms for the 60 people on the flight, so they flew us down to Edmonton where I am now. All these cities seemed so far away from each other!

We’re not really worried about our expedition on the icebreaker, because the captain and most of the crew and the science team are all here with us. We will probably just have a little less free time in the evenings to get all our activities done. The scientists might have to cut down on a little bit of their sampling. In the meantime, we have tomorrow to explore Edmonton!

September 23, 2011

Today was a fun day where I got to bond with the Schools on Board group as well as the Amundsen’s crew and scientists. In the morning, we went to the Telus World of Science. In the afternoon, we had free time at the West Edmonton Mall, the largest shopping mall in North America. In the evening, the Schools on Board Group met with the ship’s scientists and crew and went to the Eskimos game against the Alouettes. I think the crowd felt a little intimidated by the presence of 40 enthusiastic Montreal fans in the stadium.

We’re all tired after a long day, and we need our rest to be up early for the second attempt to land in Kugluktuk. Hopefully we get there this time. —Karen Butt’12

Schools on Board: Eager with Anticipation

Posted on September 22, 2011 by admin

LCC student Karen Butt is travelling through the Northwest Passage as a part of the Schools on Board/Arctic Net collaboration aboard the Amundsen. Here’s her first reflection.

September 21, 2011

I’m getting up in 4 hours to fly to Kugluktuk, and we get to board the ship once we arrive. I’m really looking forward to settling in and getting a tour of the ship. What comes after sounds so different and exciting that I can’t believe it’s real yet.—Karen Butt ’12

Grade 8 Students Engaged in Community Service PSAs

Posted on September 2, 2011 by admin

Lower Canada College’s grade 8 class wasted no time hitting the academic stream with vigour. On the first full day of classes, students were participating in community service trips and researching environmental issues. All of this hands-on experience will serve as the foundation for the production of public service ads on Friday, using numerous production tools in the i-Life Suite that is installed on their MacBook computers.

A particular emphasis this year is being placed upon ensuring that student work is publishable on-line, providing them with an authentic audience. To that end, the school is highlighting the importance of producing work that includes creative commons media licensed media or original content generated by the students. LCC has also established partnerships with companies such as www.libertymusictrax.com, who are supplying students with licensed music for their presentations that can then be freely published on our portal. — Chris Auclair, Teacher