Author: Blair Lockhart, Vancouver, BC

Melanie Jenkins credits the two years she spent completing a Master of Resource Management degree in Iceland with helping her to make an important career transition. She is senior manager, environment, for Pan American Silver Corp., a large Canadian mining company based in Vancouver. When she decided to focus her career on sustainability, Melanie opted to pursue graduate studies to help her transition away from investment banking and investor relations. She explored graduate programs in countries recognized for their sustainability leadership, such as Sweden, Norway, and England – and, at a colleague’s suggestion, Iceland. That’s how she learned about the University of Akureyri’s Master of Resource Management program at the University Centre of the Westfjords (Háskólasetur Vestfjarða), where she specialized in coastal and marine management, graduating with first class honours with distinction. Her outstanding work earned her a scholarship to study Arctic petroleum in Longyearbyen, Norway, and the opportunity to represent Iceland as part of the Arctic Frontiers Emerging Leaders program.

Author: Doug Anderson, Riverton, MB

"Remember Magnus, we took that in folk school.” As a child I often heard my mother Marjory say this to my father, Magnus, or “I met that person in folk school.” When I asked what a folk school was, I received a fond description from mother. It was not until I researched the topic as part of a course in adult education that I really discovered what folk schools were and how long they were, so this may read like an essay. I was fortunate to be able to interview the two original Manitoba folk school instructors, Helen Sisson (née Matheson) in Winnipeg and Vordis Oddleifson in Arborg. Mom and dad met in a folk school in Riverton, Manitoba, in 1950 and married in 1952. Mom and dad are gone now, so this is a tribute to them and folk schoolers past and present.

Author: Alfreda Erickson Duffy, Calgary, AB

More specifically, there was Skaftafellssýsla – a striking region in the south of the country, where glaciers stretch across the horizon and volcanic landscapes shape both the land and the lives lived upon it. It was here, in one of the most remote and physically demanding regions of Iceland, that the story of Rafnkell Eiríksson – known as Kjeli – and Halldóra Sveinsdóttir – known as Dora – begins.

Life in this part of Iceland required resilience. Families endured harsh winters, volcanic eruptions, and isolation. Travel was difficult, resources were limited, and survival depended on adaptability and community. These conditions were not unusual for Icelanders of the time, but in Skaftafellssýsla they were particularly acute.

Kjeli and Dora were both born into this environment, though they likely did not know each other as children. Kjeli left Iceland at just nine years old, while Dora remained until she was 21. Still, their families were part of the same regional and cultural world – one in which genealogy, kinship, and shared knowledge of “who belongs to whom” formed an essential part of daily life.