Awards
About Our Awards
For over fifty years, ACUNS has been advancing the knowledge and understanding of Northern Canada by making awards to exceptional students through the Canadian Northern Studies Trust (CNST).
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These awards play an important role in developing a cadre of scholars and scientists with northern experience, and also serve to enhance the educational opportunities available to northern residents.
We are as grateful to the donors whose ongoing generosity make these awards possible as we are proud of the hundreds of recipients who are he lifeblood of the programme.
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Our awards are:
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CNST Scholarship, funded by ACUNS
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Dr. Weston Blake Jr. Memorial Doctoral Scholarship, funded by the Blake family
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Kay and Peter McGeer Scholarship, funded by the McGeer family
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Jim McDonald Scholarship for Northern Research, funded by ACUNS
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The Gunther Abrahamson Caribou Research and Management Award, funded by the Beverly and Qamanirjuaq Caribou Management Board (BQCMB) and awarded biennially
Our Winners in Their Own Words
Pénélope Gervais
Dr. Weston Blake Jr. Memorial Doctoral Scholarship, 2025
"Receiving the Dr Weston Blake Jr Memorial Scholarship means so much to me. It not only highlights the importance of my research but it has also given me more time in the field to collect critical data. It's also allowed me to connect with the community of Qikiqtarjuaq and learn from their firsthand knowledge of the region."
Camille Slack
CNST Scholarship 2025
"The Canadian Northern Studies Trust has allowed me to finish up my data collections, which is very exciting. We've wrapped up a community cost of living survey, which has been ongoing in the community for the last few months, and my next steps are to analyse those results, then travel back to the community ... to verify that those results reflect community perspectives and priorities."
Vanessa Udy
Dr. Jim McDonald Scholarship for Northern Research
Vanessa Udy is conducting research for her PhD dissertation with Taku River Tlingit First Nation (TRTFN), located in Atlin, BC. Her research aims to explore constitutive principles of Tlingit law. Initial research suggests that constitutive principles of relationality and balance are operationalized through a decentralized, clan-based governance system, providing a starting point for further investigation with elders and knowledge holders from TRTFN.
Caylee Dzurka
The Kay and Peter McGeer Scholarship
Archaeologists often assume that historical Inuit communities had a strict gender binary and exclusively two-parent families, despite oral histories of role-swapping, polyamory, and gender diversity. To challenge these narratives and connect contemporary Inuit to their ancestors, Caylee’s team is with working Inuit of all gender and sexual identities from Nunatsiavut to develop an archive of oral histories of diverse relationships and gender identities. These stories include 2SLGBTQ+ Inuit experiences and those of others who do not fit the norms of Settler society, such as women who hunt.
Alexandra Kanters
Gunther Abrahamson Research and Management Award
Alexandra is a doctoral candidate in the Cumming School of Medicine’s Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary. Her interest in Arctic science began when she started working with the Kutz Research Group in 2022 on zoonoses that affect caribou, muskoxen, and people in Arctic Canada. Her research focusses on two emerging zoonotic bacteria—Brucella suis biovar 4 and Erysipelothrix rhusiopathiae—have been identified in caribou and muskoxen and are associated with both wildlife population declines and risks to people who harvest, butcher, and consume these animals.
