In the 1920s, the Church and government recognized the growing need for a new residential school to better serve Inuit children and be closer to their traditional territory. As the government reviewed possible sites, Anglican administrators selected Shingle Point on the Yukon coast as the site for a temporary and experimental “Eskimo Boarding School.” Ottawa provided a small grant to remodel existing mission buildings. This rather primitive school complex opened in 1929 and closed in 1936 when the new government-built All Saints Indian and Eskimo Residential School (Anglican) at Aklavik was ready to receive students. A similar Catholic boarding school had also been established here in 1925.
After World War II, Ottawa embarked on a program of establishing centralized federal day schools in major communities throughout the Arctic. Most were in place by 1952. A companion program was announced in 1955, calling for several large student residences to be constructed near to many of these new day schools. The hostel program was scheduled for completion by 1960. At Inuvik, the secular Alexander Mackenzie Day School was linked to the large new government hostel, which comprised two identical buildings, Anglican run Stringer Hall and Catholic run Grollier Hall. However, at Coppermine, a different approach was taken.
The concept for an experimental tent hostel was developed in 1951, with Coppermine selected as the best site (over second choice Cambridge Bay). It was to be a hybrid facility, offering Inuit students a sense of continuity in their traditional lives and imparting needed skills through a mix of “land-based” and standard government curriculum. As well, students would be supervised and billeted in tents, which would more approximate their native housing than would a residential school. The tent hostel would be operated only in the warmer months, April to August.
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