School transfers anger students, parents

MIRIAM HILL

IQALUIT — Virgil Williams is sad that he must switch from Joamie School to Nakasuk School next year.

“I’ll miss my friends,” said the Grade 4 student. “I have very few friends (at Nakasuk).”

Virgil is one of more than 50 students who the Iqaluit District Education Authority has decided to move to Nakasuk due to overcrowding at Joamie School.

Virgil’s father, Glenn Williams, isn’t just sad about the decision — he’s downright annoyed. He said Virgil has attended Joamie School since kindergarten.

Williams said the education authority hasn’t taken students’ needs into account.

“I explained (to the authority that) my son has been a member of the drum club for two years, which is only available at Joamie School, and he wants to continue drumming,” Williams said.

“None of these things were taken into consideration when it was decided they were going to move him. That bothers me.”

With a new French school opening in Iqaluit this fall, four classrooms at Nakasuk School currently dedicated to French will be freed up, allowing students from an already crowded Joamie School to transfer over.

Kathy Smith, chair of the education authority, said overcrowding has been a problem for years, but until the French school was built there were no options to remedy the problem.

“We haven’t done a boundary change in the past few years because it would have been in small pieces and it wouldn’t have relieved a lot of pressure off Joamie School,” she said. “But with 50 or 60 students, we felt that we had no choice.”

“There really was no other fair way of doing this. We didn’t want to discriminate on how long people have lived in the community, we didn’t want to discriminate on race.”

– Kathy Smith, chair, Iqaluit District Education Authority

The change means all children living in north and south Happy Valley will be moved into Nakasuk’s jurisdiction.

Smith said the education authority called parents about the decision and sent messages home, but she acknowledged that some parents remain reluctant about the change.

“There really was no other fair way of doing this. We didn’t want to discriminate on how long people have lived in the community, we didn’t want to discriminate on race,” she said. “We let parents know that both schools are bilingual schools, both schools are good schools with dedicated teachers, but because of the difference in size, they have different things they can offer kids.”

Because Nakasuk is larger it has a full-time gym teacher and a full-sized computer room. Joamie, being smaller, can do things with its whole student body that would be more difficult with a greater number of students.

Williams said he went to the most recent meeting of the education authority and outlined his concerns, but has received no response.

Smith said some children may be exempted from the move as long as overcrowding doesn’t result.

Mike Sherman said the move won’t bother his family. He has a seven-year-old boy who took kindergarten and Grade 1 at Joamie School and now will go to Nakasuk.

His son is looking forward to the change.

“He’s quite open and excited. He also thinks they have a better playground. That was a big selling point for him. For a seven-year-old, I guess that’s the high point.”