Inuksuk renovation may 'proceed; during school breaks

The Government of Nunavut has abandoned plans to teach Iqaluit's high school students inside portable buildings while Inuksuk High undergoes a major renovation, after deeming the temporary structures are too costly.

The Department of Education now says there are now two options being considered for the $21.2 million upgrade project: to build a new school, or to slowly renovate Inuksuk High during scheduled school breaks.

Parents, students and teachers will have a chance to comment on these plans during a public meeting, to be held this Saturday, June 21, at 11 a.m. at St. Jude's Parish Hall.

The portable scheme was abandoned after the education officials realized the portables would cost $15 million.

If a decision is made to build a new school, construction work would be planned to start in 2010, and be completed in 2011.

Potential sites for a new school may include lots by the Road to Nowhere, Joamie School and the Arctic Winter Games arena, but none of these sites have been finalized yet.

If the proposal to slowly upgrade the school is chosen, clean-up work would begin this summer. Ducts would be cleaned and the outside of the school would be washed.

It's not yet clear how long it would take to renovate the school during breaks – the department of education says plans are not yet complete.

Initial plans were to begin major renovations this autumn, with the old school torn down to its foundations and a new school, with wider hallways and more windows, built in its place.

But the old plan raised a difficult problem, to which the education department could find no adequate solution: where to put all the kids?

The government initially proposed to send high school students to Aqsarniit School during renovations, with some students attending class early in the morning, and others until late in the afternoon.

But this plan proved widely unpopular with parents and was dropped.

If a new school is built, it will likely be smaller than Inuksuk High School, Ed Picco, the education minister, has warned in the past. That's because the government builds schools using a formula that gives so much floor space for every student. And, based on this formula, Inuksuk High is currently too big.

The public meeting is scheduled six months after it was supposed to have been held, in December. Consecutive delays to a public meeting prompted finger-pointing earlier this year between education department officials and members of the Iqaluit District Education Authority.

They've since made amends. Lori Idlout, the IDEA chair, praised the "collaborative approach" of the education department in a joint press release.