Conrad Elementary School students will soon have an opportunity to honour Prince Rupert veterans who sacrificed their lives during the First and Second World Wars.
A group of 46 Grade 4s and 5s will make the trip to the Fairview Cemetery on Nov. 6, where they will clean the graves of the city’s nine soldiers who died in war.
There are currently two from the First World War and seven from the Second World War with graves at the cemetery.
The idea originated with Dawn Quast, a former teacher who is currently a member of the city’s cemetery advisory committee.
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Quast has been involved with a number of Remembrance Day events, but said she wanted to do something to help educate young students about the day at an earlier age.
“How do we bring more awareness to the general public and the kids that the celebration or recognition of the veterans or war dead does go on?” she asked.
Quast reached out to some former colleagues at Conrad School as well as the Prince Rupert Legion to gauge interest in facilitating a trip to the cemetery, and the idea was enthusiastically accepted.
The students also had a chance to meet with members of the Prince Rupert Legion where they heard about the local veterans’ experiences and helped them make poppies.
Barb Dias, the other teacher for the group, said the students were happy to meet the legion members and hear their stories.
“They’re at that age where they really do enjoy learning and hearing about different things,” she said. “They have lots of questions so it’s a good time to pique their interest.”
After Remembrance Day ceremonies at the school on Nov. 9, the students will return to the cemetery where they will hold another ceremony, recite In Flanders Fields and light candles to place on the graves.
Cindy Paul, one of the teachers for the group, said the two trips will be a good experience for the young students, who are many generations removed from either war.
“I think they need to know what the history of our country is and why we went to war,” she said. “There aren’t a lot of veterans of the First and Second World Wars left, so we wanted to instill in them why we go to the cenotaph and hold all these ceremonies on Remembrance Day.”
The trip will be the second time in recent months that the spotlight has been shone on the war dead in Prince Rupert. In September, Dominique Boulais — an inspector with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Canadian Agency — visited Prince Rupert where he inspected the headstones at the cemetery and requested that the municipality clean them.
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