It often appears as if circumpolar school administrators believe that the quality of education varies with the number of photocopiers purchased, the variety of textbooks available or the shape and novelty of their school buildings. The idea that a teacher might be the single most important factor in a child's education often escapes mention. Yet the failure of schools in northern Canada and Alaska to produce enough graduates to meet even the limited local demand for workers can be traced, almost certainly, to the absence of trained native teachers and to the total lack of continuity provided by southern teachers, who stay for only two or three years in the north, keeping their locus of existence firmly rooted in the south.

Investigations into conditions in Arctic and Antarctic seas were carried out during the late 18th and 19th centuries by private as well as government-sponsored expeditions. While the French occupied themselves with exploration mainly within tropical and temperate waters, Britishinterests lay in the Arctic regions, where a possible route through to the Pacific might be found, and as the location for whaling and sealing operations. It was to the advantage of these industries to discover how deep the polar seas were, to determine the water temperature and quality, and to understand the tides and currents flowing round their shores. But for a long time scientists failed to grasp that the key to water quality and movement lay in elucidating thetemperature profile from surface to sea bed. The instruments available before 1874 were not capable of resolving this profile and it was not until the end of the 19th century that measurements were made of sufficient accuracy to enable the various water masses and their consequent movements to be calculated theoretically from intensive temperature studies. By this time initiative for such work had passed into the hands of Norwegian scientists and Britain was represented only as a member of the International Commission for Exploration of the Sea (ICES), established in 1902.

During recent years there has been a steady increase in the total world fish catch (including shellfish) to a plateau, reached in the early 1970's, of around 70 million tonnes. Although much of the increase in the past decade has been due to the Anchoveta fishery, if that component is excluded the underlying trend is still upward (Gulland, 1976). This increasing pressure on the established fishery resources has meant that in recent years there has been a tendency for those nations with a distant water fishing capability to look further afield. Although much of this exploratory fishing has been in areas reasonably close to good harbour facilities, the recent trend by coastal states of establishing 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zones has meant that the Southern Ocean, an area of limited international control, has receiveda great deal of attention.

Prior to the summer of 1932 only three ships had succeeded in traversing the Northern Sea Route: Nordenskiöld's Vega in 1878–79 from Atlantic to Pacific (Nordenskiold, 1881) and the Imperial Navy icebreakers Taymyr and Vaygach from Pacific to Atlantic in 1914–15 (Starokadomskiy, 1976, p 180–262). Both of these expeditions were unable to complete the passage in one season, but were forced by ice conditions to winter in the Arctic.

During the austral summer 1977–78 the Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI) conducted a fifth season of airborne radio echo sounding in Antarctica as part of a joint project with the US National Science Foundation Division of Polar Programs (NSF-DPP) and the Technical University of Denmark (TUD). In addition, trials were undertaken of a magnetometer installation, developed and operated, under NSF contract, by the Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) of the Johns Hopkins University, USA.

Five main British Antarctic Survey stations were occupied throughout the year. These were Faraday and Halley (the two geophysical observatories), Signy (the main biological station), Grytviken (a multi-disciplinary sub-Antarctic station) and Rothera (the centre for air operations). The 1977 winter passed uneventfully and the stations were relieved in the 1977–78 summer, as usual, by the two Survey ships RRS John Biscoe and RRS Bransfield and two Twin Otter aircraft. However, ice conditions in the Antarctic Peninsula area were severe; although Halley was relieved without too much difficulty at the beginning of January, the ships were unable to reach Rothera until the end of February. By that time it was too late for major building operations, and the third and final phase of the development of Rothera (the construction of another large building) had to be postponed.

Polar Record, Vol 19, No 118, January, 1978, pp 13 and 16. The figure caption on p. 13 refers to the map on p 16, and the caption on p 16 to the map on p 13.