Arctic Bay (Jul 03/06) - The working group set up by Indian and Northern Affairs minister Jim Prentice to implement the Berger report might want to take some advice from Arctic Bay educator Morty Alooloo: focus on the family.

The federal government has established a working group to find ways to ensure more Nunavut students, including these Iqaluit kindergarten kids, finish school. - NNSL file photo

Alooloo said a high dropout rate in her community stems from family units that aren't as tight as they once were. Too many teenagers seem more interested in hanging out and staying up late than doing school work, she said.

"When they become teenagers they're basically on their own," Alooloo said.

"They won't listen to their parents nowadays."

Of 80 high school students who attended Inuujaq school last fall, half had dropped out by December, said Alooloo, who will become an assistant principal at the school next year.

In his report, released in March, conciliator Thomas Berger called for bilingual education from primary to Grade 12 to combat high dropout rates in Nunavut. He also called for $20 million to help more Nunavummiut attend post-secondary schools.

Three quarters of Nunavut students never finish high school, and that limits access to jobs, Berger said.

In April, Prentice said the federal government needed time to examine the report. Late last month he announced the creation of a working group that would examine Berger's report.

It isn't clear who will sit on the working group or if the government of Nunavut will even be represented because requests for an interview with Prentice were brushed aside by DIAND staffers.

On Friday, Premier Paul Okalik said he's aware that a working group has been established, but he wouldn't discuss its composition. Okalik said he'd like to see the working group endorse Berger's report.

"We've introduced additional dollars for bilingual education as a government and I look forward to the federal government doing their part to meet the report's recommendations," he said.

Berger recommended an education system that treats Inuktitut as a base Inuit students can use to go on and learn English.

"Loss of first language skills, while often not an apparent handicap, nevertheless can significantly retard academic progress," Berger wrote.

Alooloo said young parents are speaking to their children at home in English more, which is leading to confusion when the children enter bilingual education in primary school.

When kids revert to English-only education in later grades, they end up struggling in both languages, Alooloo said.

Strengthening Inuktitut in the home would strengthen it in school, as it did with her generation, she said.

"We learned English faster that way once your first language is very solid."