Coast Mountain School District #82

Coast Mountain School District - #82

Many Gitksan and local First Nation students attend the public schools which are within School District #82 - Coast Mountain. There are a number of schools in the area: Kitwanga Elementary School, New Hazelton Elementary (recently south town school joined in), John Field Elementary and Hazelton Secondary School. You can find the local school calendar for school closures and professional development days here. The First Nations High school information is listed under the GWES section of this website.

The local trustee for the Hazelton/Kitwanga is Lynn Newbery. The First Nations District Principal is Cheryl Sebastian. 

The Ministry of Education provides enhanced funding to school age students of Aboriginal ancestry.  Enhanced funding provides culturally appropriate educational programs and services to support the success of Aboriginal students.  Local school programs and services might focus on career, culture and educational supports with collaborative funding decisions made with the local First Nations of the district.  For more information about the targeted aboriginal education provincial program click here. Program 1.31 (Aboriginal Education Program) specific information is not available on the Coast Mountain School District website.

Within the BC Aboriginal Education approach a collaborative working relationship can be reached  by negotiating a  local education agreement between the local Bands and the School District. The BC Ministry of Education has identified Coast Mountain District as in the early planning stages to begin exploring an Aboriginal Education Agreement.   For more information contact your Band Education Coordinator or GWES for more information.

For BC public schools: How are We Doing? is the annual aboriginal education report published by the Ministry of Education. This provides a provincial overview of how well aboriginal students are doing in the public school system.  For more local district information regarding aboriginal student outcomes, and use the same link for local school aboriginal student outcomes. Each year there are school satisfaction surveys that are available for parents of students in certain grades to fill out online. The most recent report is available in the district information - under 'satisfaction survey' of the report. Parents can also get involved in parent advisory committees or participate in the school planning council groups of their school.