Community Life

Inuit communities are relatively small, with populations ranging from 150 to 5,000 residents. Most have a couple of stores, municipal buildings, an airport, houses, a school or two, an arena and a health centre.

Transportation

Few communities have road access to southern points, or even to neighbouring villages. There are, however, roads in and around each village. Most businesses and some families own vehicles, such as vans or trucks or a car to drive around town. More people, particularly in smaller communities, rely on snowmobiles in winter and ATVs in summer, which are more versatile and travel off-road as well.

The communities rely heavily on scheduled air service for supplies and passenger travel. During the summer months, construction material, bulk goods and heavy machinery are delivered by sealift. The high cost of freight produces an extremely high cost of living.

Housing

Housing is a big concern in the Arctic. In most communities, housing is provided and maintained by regional and federal governments. The cost of living combined with high unemployment rates means most communities have long waiting lists for housing, so there are often three generations living under the same roof.

Health

Basic health service is available through a combination of local health centres and visiting doctors, dentists and eye specialists who fly in two or three times each year. Patients are sent either to regional or southern hospitals for more urgent treatment. In emergency situations, when a patient cannot wait for a scheduled flight, they are sent south by air ambulance, more commonly known as a medivac.

Education

During the first two decades of the transition to settled communities, Inuit children were sent to residential schools for primary education. In the 1950s and 60s, federal day schools were established locally to provide Inuit children with an elementary school education. Students wishing to continue their studies were sent to southern high schools or universities.

Today, every community has at least one school, educating local youth from kindergarten through high school. In some regions, the Inuit language is taught full-time from kindergarten until third grade, at which point classroom instruction is mainly in English with part-time Inuit language classes. In Nunavik, students choose English or French as a language of study once they reach third grade. Inuit strongly believe their children should know their mother tongue, but also appreciate the advantages of having a second or even third language.

Adult education programs are offered in most of the larger communities, although many students opt to attend southern universities. Nunavut Arctic College and Aurora College in the Inuvialuit region have also been producing college graduates.

Economic Development

Unemployment rates in Inuit communities have always been high. Too often, employees were imported from outside the Arctic to deliver programs and services to Inuit.

From the start, these services were delivered in a manner insensitive to Inuit culture. As the first wave of graduates from residential and federal day schools came into the workforce, it was also apparent that Inuit could fill many of the positions held by workers from the South.

Until the regional land claims negotiations began, career aspirations for Inuit in smaller communities were limited mainly to clerical jobs and manual labour.

The development of marketing cooperatives presented new ways of taking control of local and regional economic activity. Many local cooperatives provide local services, such as retail sales, accommodation and arts and crafts promotion.

Since the land claim agreements were settled, a new sense of optimism has fueled economic development in Inuit communities. The organizations that administer the agreements have become important employers across the regions. Each organization also has an economic development branch to help boost Inuit-owned business ventures. Inuit-owned and operated airlines, fisheries, art galleries, tour companies, construction firms and other businesses are a visible part of today’s modern Arctic economy.

The land claims agreements include training and Inuit employment quotas for all companies interested in doing business in the regions. There is also a great desire to achieve economic self sufficiency in the North in a way that incorporates Inuit cultural values into modern business practices.