Most teacher travel programs just select you and send you on your way, or do some online training first.  PolarTREC actually sent me to Fairbanks, Alaska (in February) for more than a week of training, just to prepare me for my Finland expedition!

I learned so much in Alaska.  I learned how to blog from the field, which not everyone was doing in 2009.  I learned how to take good photographs (low light angles, rule of thirds, sometimes put a human in the scene), some first aid and Arctic survival skills, and most of all, I learned more about the Arctic.

We went to the critically acclaimed Museum of the North, went underground in a permafrost tunnel, visited with musk oxen and caribou at the University of Alaska’s large animal farm, drove out to see the pipeline, saw the thrilling end to the Yukon Quest dogsled race, attended the World Ice Art Championships, and did other things: https://www.polartrec.com/expeditions/prehistoric-human-response-to-climate-change/journals/2009-02-23

This trip was well worth it in its own right.  Even if I hadn’t gone to Finland, it would have been a fantastic experience all by itself.