Nunavut DEAs aren’t laughing about prank bomb threats

Inuksuk High School in Iqaluit cancelled classes for the day and sent all students and staff home after the school received another fake bomb threat just before 11 a.m., Oct. 9. (FILE PHOTO)

Local education representatives from across Nunavut said Oct. 14 in Iqaluit that they’re worried about repeated fake bomb threats at Inuksuk High School in Iqaluit, and that they’re worried about the security of school buildings across Nunavut.

“Issues of security to school buildings are becoming more frequent in smaller communities too,” Theo Ikummak of the Igloolik District Education Authority said at the Coalition of Nunavut’s DEAs annual general meeting at the Frobisher Inn.

“Schools should be a safe learning environment.”

Jeannie A. Kullualik, a coalition board member and a policy analyst with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., told Nunatsiaq News that, as a parent of two kids, she’s frustrated by the resources wasted on prank bomb threats.

There have been at least three at Inuksuk High School this year so far.

“There were reports of somebody dragged by a trailer at the Four Corners at the same time RCMP were investigating the last bomb threat,” Kullualik said.

“What if that was something really serious, that needed immediate emergency attention, but police were dealing with the fake bomb threat?” she said.

Two members of Iqaluit’s RCMP addressed Inuksuk High students in an assembly last week, Sgt. Yvonne Niego of Nunavut’s V division told Nunatsiaq News Oct. 14.

Niego said the assembly was called to make sure students know all the people and groups affected by a prank bomb threat, like the community groups who use the facility after school hours, or the daycare run out of Inuksuk High.

“It may seem like a fake bomb threat is a minor thing,” Niego said. “But it’s actually a direct threat to everybody in the building, including babies in the daycare.”

The Iqaluit DEA issued a public service announcement on Facebook Oct. 10 that said students movements during class time “will be monitored to ensure school safety” as an interim measure.

“Students aren’t free to go to the washroom or to hang out in the hallways without a teacher’s note,” Kullualik said.

“It’s inconvenient for the kids, but it’s about safety.”

Ikummak wondered if other negative trends — like bullying and poor attendance rates — were associated with increased security concerns at schools.

“Students who want to learn, should have the opportunity to do that as much as they can in our system,” he said.