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Arctic Yearbook 2014
they grew up with, largely as a result of the disruption caused by the same foreign system, and it
inevitably affects both their commitment to education and their ability to cope with the intercultural
challenges.
Discussion
The Arctic engineering education has been a success in the sense that it supplies to Greenland
Greenlandic engineers, who exhibit solid knowledge of the Greenlandic society and the technical
challenges associated with the extreme Arctic climate. The success is best measured by the fact that
all graduates have a job, with 95% of the Greenlandic engineers and a couple of the Danish working
in Greenland. There is great demand for the Arctic engineers in Greenland.
However, it has still not been possible to solve the challenges that arise from the fact that some of
the Greenlandic students begin with inadequate prerequisites, and many start the program without
sufficient academic levels in Danish, mathematics and natural sciences from their primary and
secondary educations, the latter of which is still provided in most students’ second language. It is
very difficult for a higher education institution to raise the level of the basic prerequisite areas, while
the students have to follow the rapid progression in the engineering disciplines. As a consequence,
the focus is now on guiding the students that