Cultural school needs a home

The Department of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth has issued a call to communities who want to see the proposed cultural school, Piqqusilirivvik, in their community.

CLEY mailed out a request for letters of interest to district education authorities and others on April 12.

“The department anticipates that there will be active interest shown from the communities and foresees that it will be challenging to select the location,” says the letter, signed by Louis Tapardjuk, the culture minister.

Interested communities were to submit a letter of interest by today, and follow up with an eight-to-12 page proposal by May 15.

The letter does not specify who should submit the proposal, but does say that only one will be accepted per community. “This will require your community to coordinate with various agencies to ensure that only one proposal is submitted,” the letter says.

The Iqaluit DEA agreed at its Monday night meeting to ask around to see if other groups, such as the City of Iqaluit, were interested in working on a proposal.

Jeannie Eeseemailie, an IDEA member, pointed out that Iqaluit is a strong candidate for the school, because it includes people from all of Nunavut’s unique cultural traditions, and has the highest number of people who are losing their traditional language and skills.