Baker Lake (Apr 26/06) - Baker Lake students studied career choices at Jonah Amitnaaq secondary school earlier this month.

The one-day fair, organized by Rhoda Perkison and Daniel Piryuaq, featured 16 displays in the school gym.

Teacher Bill Cooper says there's been a lot of career work done at the school during the past few years.

He says the ball started rolling towards the fair when he was approached by career development officer Hilu Scottie this past fall.

"Hilu was aware of some grant money we could obtain to put on a career fair and we were quite interested in the idea," says Cooper.

"She wrote a proposal to the local district education authority and it supported the idea.

"We had less than a month to bring the fair together once the funding arrived."

Perkison and Piryuaq surveyed students in Grade 9 to 12 as to what types of careers they would like highlighted.

The two then used the survey results to bring the 16 presenters together.

Among those in attendance were Winnipeg's Red River College, the Canadian Forces, Nunavut Arctic College, RCMP, Nunavut Teachers Education program, Cumberland Resources Ltd. and Calm Air.

A number of local tradespeople also took part.

Seven information sessions were held on the morning of the fair, with students given their choice of two sessions to attend.

Cooper says the students were given an evaluation to rate the fair upon its conclusion.

"At one point in the afternoon we had about 250 students together with a number of local residents.

"Any time you can have that many students in the gym and not have problems, it's a well-directed activity.

"A lack of discipline problems usually indicates something good is going on."

Cooper says school staff would like to access the funding again in 2007.

He says although they're satisfied with this year's fair, there's always room for improvement.

"We're getting better in the Kivalliq in showing students they have options beyond high school.

"We can hand out diplomas to students who graduate from Grade 12 and feel like we did our job.

"But it's what they do with the diploma that shows me how well we did our job."