Arctic Congress Bodø 2024 took place from 29 May to 3 June 2024 in Bodø, Norway, hosted by Nordland Research Institute and Nord University. The event brought three conferences together in the European Capital of Culture 2024: the International Congress of Arctic Social Sciences (ICASS) XI, UArctic Congress 2024, and High North Dialogue 2024.
APECS, the Polar Science Early Career Community Office (PSECCO) and the High North Dialogue Academy hosted an early career and youth networking event on 29 May in the foyer of the Stormen Concert Hall, before the overall conference ice breaker. There were approximately 150 attendees. The event provided a fun and informal way for people to meet each other and share ideas and interests before the rest of the conference program began. Each organization was briefly presented and attendees were engaged in brainstorming how (polar) early career organizations could best support their work.
There were a number of congress sessions and events directed specifically towards ECRs and youth, including: “Witness Change, Find Solutions: A Dialogue on Indigenous Youth Engagement in the Arctic Council”, “Strategies for centering Indigenous voices for Arctic community-led research and co-production of knowledge for early career researchers”, and “Building & Sustaining Strategic Linkages for Network-to-Network Arctic Research Collaboration”. In the latter session, Susan Vanek gave a presentation entitled: Exploring the Past, Present, and Future of USAPECS: Lessons from a Decade of Supporting Early Career Research Across National and International Polar Networks. In addition to this, multiple APECS members attended the conference and gave presentations. It was great to meet some of these members at the networking event!
The day before the conference began, APECS Executive Director, Sarah Strand, participated in the Svalbard Social Science Initiative’s workshop “Building transdisciplinary bridges for sustainable Svalbard and Arctic development”. Sarah gave a presentation on APECS’ perspectives on and experiences with inter- and transdisciplinarity and local stakeholder involvement in Arctic research.
Sarah Strand and APECS member Erika Varik contributed to the Arctic Congress Bodø 2024 Program Committee, which organized which sessions would take place.
