Home page

Text size

E-mail this page

KINNGAIT/CAPE DORSET
When Ina Pittman retires from her student support position at Sam Pudlat School later this month, she will do so with the title of longest-staying teacher in Cape Dorset.

Ina Pittman, a student support teacher at Sam Pudlat School in Cape Dorset, will retire on Jan. 24, almost 12 years after she started teaching in the south Baffin community. She is the teacher who stayed the longest in Cape Dorset. - photo courtesy of Lisa Kelly

Family pressures from the south and two grandchildren set to arrive into this world in the first half of this year made her decide to retire.

"I would have really liked to stay around for another while but there is too much family pressure in the south," she said, adding she'll be back in the future. "I'm sort of happy to be going to spend time with my daughters because both of them are pregnant but I'm also sad to be leaving behind my Northern friends.

"I have the reputation of being the longest-staying teacher in Cape Dorset."

She will have stayed 11 and a half years. Before her, another couple was there for eight years, she added.

Born and raised in Rocky Harbour, N.L., the largest community in the Gros Morne National Park, Pittman taught 22 years in the province's west coast and Northern peninsula mostly as an elementary student support teacher.

With her two children grown and off to university, Pittman was set to teach in Korea but decided against it, thinking she would prefer a northern culture. She said she was offered a position in Clyde River when the SST position opened in Cape Dorset. She arrived in the south Baffin community in September 2000. She was also the vice-principal at Sam Pudlat in 2009 and 2010.

"I've had a very positive experience in Cape Dorset," she said. "I've had a great, great run here. Cape Dorset is a beautiful, beautiful town. All Northern communities, we have our problems but it's like a home to me – and I know some day, I'll be back again after things settle down and I've had a rest."

She added she's gotten used to the community and everybody knows her.

Her home awaits in Rocky Harbour and two grandchildren are set to be born this year – one in February, the other in June.

Pittman will turn 60 on Jan. 22, and she will officially retire on Jan. 24.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.