TALOYOAK/SPENCE BAY - For Netsilik School teacher Mary Eetoolook, the best part about teaching is watching students receive their diplomas on graduation day.

Netsilik School teacher Mary Eetoolook receives a plaque from Taloyoak mayor Charlie Lyall during her retirement party on May 6. Eetoolook was a teacher for more than 35 years. - photo courtesy of Gina Pizzo

"When I see them graduating, it makes me really proud," Eetoolook said. "I made a difference to the children, to the students who are in their teens now."

Eetoolook knows what it takes to help students reach their goals. She has been a teacher for more than 35 years in both Cambridge Bay and Taloyoak, first working as a classroom assistant and a language specialist before becoming a full-time teacher.

Eetoolook said becoming a teacher was not part of her plan while she was growing up. Her mother would have liked her to focus on more traditional activities, but Eetoolook said she loved what she was learning while attending school in Inuvik.

"She was a traditional woman and she figured I should be learning to sew and do housework and stuff like that," she said. "Since I wanted to go back to school so badly, I decided to apply for classroom assistant or something like that, if something came up here (Taloyoak)."

Eetoolook said she also started taking the time to learn on her own, all the while raising a family.

"That was back in the 1970s, I said to myself 'I can take courses and keep up with my reading and writing and my math,'" she said. "At the same time I was starting a family and my kids were small. That's how it all started."

She said the job was sometimes overwhelming at first.

"At the beginning, as a language specialist, I didn't have any idea what I was getting myself into," she said. "As the years went along, I started becoming more aware of how teaching was."

With encouragement from her husband James Eetoolook, now Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. first vice-president, and colleagues, she decided to take the Nunavut Teachers Education Program and graduated in 1995.

Eetoolook has been a Grade 2 teacher at Netsilik School for many years now, which she said she finds rewarding.

"When they start really reading and writing and getting to be aware of what school is all about, that really starts getting interesting," she said.

Eetoolook is retiring this year and her family, friends and co-workers held a retirement part for her on May 6.

Netsilik School principal Gina Pizzo said Eetoolook focused on ensuring culture had a place within the school community.

"Her legacy would be working towards bringing back Inuktitut and language and culture into the school," she said.

Pizzo also said Eetoolook acted as a role model for her colleagues.

"She's always been a mentor for other teachers," she said.

When asked if she had any words of advice for Nunavut's future high school graduates and future teachers Eetoolook said,

"You keep on going and you don't stop until you accomplish something."