Polar Academy Field Work Training in Greenland
The Polar Academy: working in partnership with University of St Andrews
Now in its third year of partnership, the St Andrews Glaciology Group and the Polar Academy—a Scottish children’s charity—jointly support motivated secondary school pupils who have faced significant disruptions to their education, through a science outreach programme centred on polar science and polar fieldwork training.
Each year, Emma Cameron (PhD student in Glaciology) and Dr TJ Young (Lecturer in Physical Geography) from the School of Geography and Sustainable Development, work alongside St Andrews alumni Fiona McPherson from the Polar Academy to run a science outreach programme designed to contextualise the participants’ annual expedition to southeast Greenland and broaden their access to scientific learning in a university setting.
Preparing for Polar Fieldwork
Two full-day workshops are held in St Andrews, co-designed by Emma Cameron, Fiona McPherson and the Polar Academy. The workshops prepare pupils to undertake an independent science project during their expedition to Greenland or Finland.
The first workshop introduces the Polar Academy expedition team to the scientific background of their project, as well as the fundamentals of polar fieldwork and climate science. The pupils learn how to safely deploy and use the atmospheric and oceanographic instruments they will work with during their expedition, gaining hands-on experience in a controlled outdoor environment—the East Sands beach!
After returning from their expedition, Polar Academy participants rejoin staff and students on campus for a second workshop, where they review the results of their science project. The pupils then present their findings in a public session for the School, sharing both the results of their project and their experiences during the expedition.
This August, Emma travelled to Greenland with the Polar Academy to develop and trial a new suite of science experiments for future teams. Working with two recent Polar Academy graduates, Kyle and Hunter, they collected data on the marine environment and tested experiments using weather meters to explore how mountains influence local weather systems. The trip was a success, and feedback from the young people involved will help shape and refine the experiments for next year’s expedition.
Supporting pathways beyond school
Beyond the field programme, TJ Young leads a structured mentoring programme that runs alongside these activities. In collaboration with the University’s Access and Widening Participation Team, participants engage in a goal-setting exercise, and map their route towards what they envision life beyond high school would ideally look like. Individualised pathways are developed for each student, whether towards further or higher education, the outdoor industry, or skilled trades.
By meeting pupils in their own schools and welcoming them into our laboratories, teaching spaces, and community areas, the science outreach programme as a whole aims to challenge assumptions about who belongs at university. Many participants—who might previously have discounted higher education—encounter St Andrews as an achievable, supportive, and relevant environment, regardless of how non‑linear their educational journey has been.
Photos
Kyle, a recent Polar Academy graduate, takes weather readings up a mountain in Greenland (August 2026) to help trial a new science project for next year’s cohort.
August 2026: Hunter, a recent Polar Academy graduate deploys a CTD in Greenland to measure the temperature and salinity of fjord waters, as well as a Secchi Disk to measure water turbidity.
Before their expedition, the Polar Academy team comes to St Andrews, and the teenagers are trained in polar fieldwork methods at the East Sands beach
