Deaths in Thunder Bay, Ont., prompt First Nation to pursue new high school

First Nations that send their children to high school in Thunder Bay, Ont., are looking for other options after the deaths of nine Indigenous students in the city.

Most remote First Nations in northern Ontario do not have high schools of their own and more than 100 teens travel to Thunder Bay each year to pursue their education.A meeting is planned next month to look at sending students to high schools outside the city, according to the Nishnawbe Aski Nation.

Some First Nations are hoping to create high school programs of their own, as per a recommendation from last year's inquest into the deaths of seven First Nations students in Thunder Bay, who died between 2000 and 2011.

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"Thechief has told me that [grades]11 and 12 arean important issue for the community and for himself, which has been long-standing, but I think it was greatly precipitated by the things that have been happening in Thunder Bay," said Dean Cromarty, who has been working with Wunnumin Lake First Nation on a plan to build a new school.

The deaths in May of Tammy Keeash and Josiah Beggboth teenswho were in Thunder Bay to access services not available in their remote First Nationsareweighing heavily on the minds of families and community leaders, he said.

Wunnumin Lake is in the midst of a feasibility study to build a new school to replace a 30-year-old structure, but will need to negotiate with Indigenous and Northern Affairs to break outside its usual funding formula if it wants to include Grades 11 and 12, Cromarty said.

The federal department requires a First Nation to have a minimum of 25 students to fund Grades 11 and 12, he said. Currently Wunnumin Lake has about a dozen students in those grades.

"I think that's where the student inquest recommendations come in," Cromarty said. "There needs to be a high school in every community so that our kids don't have to go out to urban centres for education.... regardless of the number of students we have."

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