If you're living in Sachs Harbour, Trout Lake, or Tsiigehtchic, among several other communities, finishing high school there is not always an option. The communities are too small to pay for a full-time high school teacher, and the GNWT's online learning program only goes so far.

For a few students in Grades 10-12 this means going to school in either Yellowknife, Inuvik, Rae-Edzo or Fort Simpson. The pressure to succeed also comes with the loneliness of completing their studies far away from loved ones and home.

Tanya and Harry Elias run a boarding home in Inuvik. They've been taking in students from remote Beaufort and Delta communities for the last three years. The maximum number they can take on is 12 but there's only four in their home right now.

Tanya Elias says she tries to make the students feel at home as much as possible.

"We try to serve a lot of traditional foods and just try and make it feel like a home," says Elias. "We try to make them feel as comfortable as possible, just try and respect the differences between all the students that come."

Sixteen-year-old Catherine Kuptana says Tanya and Harry make her feel right at home while she's away from her family in Sachs Harbour.

Catherine's mother, Jackie, who was in town last week visiting, says she dearly misses her daughter, but knows "she has to go to school."

"And we don't have the facilities in Sachs Harbour, so she has to come here," says Jackie.

A family approach The Beaufort-Delta Education council's student boarding program rose from out of the ashes of Inuvik's now notorious residential school, Grollier Hall.

The school was open for decades but closed down in 1996. During its earlier years it was the only institution in the Delta region where children could receive an education. Its infamy drew from a number of high-profile court cases involving physical and sexual abuse at the hands of Roman Catholic supervisors between 1959 and 1979.

The education council's director, James Anderson, says their is little to compare between their student boarding program and Grollier Hall.

"It's a family model with a small number of students and run just as well as any well-organized home would run," says Anderson.

He says the program will remain in place as long as the need continues.

"It's hard to know what the future will hold," says Anderson. "There's no one answer to successful high school programs. I think though most parents want options, and this is a viable option for many of our students but perhaps not all."

Sending students to board in hub communities is not cheap -- $20,700 for a full-time student going from Sachs Harbour to Inuvik for a year.

Nonetheless, Education, Culture and Employment Minister Jake Ootes, says the program is necessary in communities where only a handful of students are of high school age.

"There are a couple situations, especially in the small communities that still don't have either the capacity to offer high school because of infrastructure or it's just not planned yet," says Ootes.

ECE initiated an online learning program for high school students in remote communities three years ago, but the program is still in relative infancy. Moreover, in order for students to use it, a qualified instructor needs to be present -- a difficult scenario for a community with a small student base and an equally small budget.

Learning to lead One curriculum that stands apart in the NWT is the Western Arctic Leadership program.

It's rooted in the idealistic principles that grew with former students of the now closed Grandin College in Fort Smith. Senator Nick Sibbeston, Western Arctic Liberal MP Ethel Blondin-Andrew and Premier Stephen Kakfwi all went to school there, along with dozens of other influential Northerners.

The leadership program takes the brightest and the best from communities all across the NWT, and sends them to board in Fort Smith.

Pupils attend classes at P.W. Kaeser high school like any other student, but with an added emphasis on Northern values and leadership.

The GNWT funded program accepts a maximum of only 19 students a year.

"Basically what we do is we put everything in place for them to succeed," says the program's chair, Earl Jacobson.

The students go out onto the land twice a year, are given lifestyle training -- right up to the proper way to wash their clothes, and hear from numerous lecturers on leadership.

"We're constantly bringing in role models," says Jacobson. "I mean, all our MLAs have been there at least once visiting."

-- with files from Tara Kearsey