Trades students in Rankin Inlet to help build student housing
Pilot project brings 6 units to Nunavut Arctic College campus; First Nations company to assist in construction
Pewapun Construction Ltd. board member Jim Moore speaks with Nunavut Housing Corp. president Eiryn Devereaux, left, and Lorne Kusugak, minister responsible for Nunavut Housing Corporation. Pewapun — a Manitoba-based First Nation company, has committed $3 million to a pilot project that will see Nunavut Arctic College trades students help build their own student housing. (Photo by David Lochead)
Six new housing units, built by students and for students, are coming to Nunavut.
“I’m very excited about it and I know the students and future students in the trade school in Rankin Inlet are just as excited,” said Lorne Kusugak, minister responsible for Nunavut Housing Corp., on Wednesday.
Kusugak was at Nunavut Arctic College’s Nunatta Campus in Iqaluit for the official signing of an agreement between Nunavut Housing Corp., Nunavut Arctic College and Pewapun Construction Ltd. that will bring six student-housing units to Rankin Inlet.
Pewapun, a Manitoba-based and First Nations construction company, will provide $3 million for materials and construction support. The Nunavut government will provide the land.
What differs with this housing agreement is it is a pilot project where the housing will be partly built by students. Pewapun will design housing kits that will be shipped to Rankin Inlet.
The majority of the construction will occur in Rankin Inlet, where 20 to 40 students in the Nunavut Arctic College skilled trades worker program will participate in building the units.
Skilled tradespeople from Pewapun will come to Rankin Inlet to train and assist in construction.
The work is expected to begin in July and be finished by summer 2025.
Kusugak said he hopes the project replicates the success Pewapun has had in its own northern Manitoba community of Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation.
Like Nunavut, Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation has had housing challenges, but Pewapun has been able to train locals to become tradespeople in their community.
“That’s incredible, and we need to do that here too,” Kusugak said.
“This [pilot project] sets the footprint and path for us to be to do that.”
Nunavut Arctic College president Rebecca Mearns said students are the next generation tradespeople in Nunavut and they require learning and experience to become qualified in their trades.
“Initiatives like this pilot project are what are needed to bridge that gap and uplift these students into [their] careers,” she said.
Pewapun board member Jim Moore spoke at the news conference about the origins of Pewapun as a social enterprise.
He said it was created to give the First Nations people in his community the opportunity to get jobs and skills they could use to make a living, while also providing themselves with a home.
Creating Pewapun was not about getting rich, but sharing and helping people out, and the intention is to share with Nunavummiut what has made the program successful.
“And that’s the primary reason we are so excited to be here,” Moore said.
The ole don’t look over there at the 3.. 6 or more sitting empty Housing Association houses in Rankin Inlet. Still hooked up and paying for power. Some were fuel tank filled and billed for years.
But let’s party hardy with politicians about 6 new houses using the same decades old story line… partly built by locals.
Why won’t Housing Corp, first, put up the sitting empty houses for sale? The houses would sell lickety-split.
Let the new home owner do the renovations. They would hire local construction companies who already hire locals to help with the renovations.
Almost instantly 6 or more families with a new home. And if they moved out of a housing association house, it’ll allow 6 or more homeless families to move into a housing house.
Then build the student homes.
Based on past and current attendance and student output at NAC programs… this will never be completed. Unless you know, qallunaat contractors do it. Newfs and Wee Wees (oui oui).
Oh yah, well the Trad school finished their pilot project of one unit this year and a family moved in already. So why so skeptical?
Trade school needs to start with shops in school school and no later than age 10, with the facilities open evenings and weekends.
As for education generally, you can get the sense of what educational thinking in Japan is all about from the title of the book by the co-founder or Sony. Kindergarten is too late. Of course, teachers there don’t put up with the kind of trouble reported in schools across Canada and not just in Nunavut.