A group of seven high school students who had hoped to spend three weeks in Russia are back in Canada after cutting their plans short due to the spread of the novel coronavirus.
“We’re all safe and sound and healthy and we’re back on Canadian soil and we’ll be back on the Coast if all goes smoothly, hopefully within 24 hours,” Elphinstone Secondary School teacher Glen MacPherson said from Toronto on March 17.
“I quite frankly don’t know where to begin if I even tried to summarize what we've been through over the past week,” said MacPherson, who had spent more than 18 months planning the trip with the group of students.
Details of their journey home are few at this point. The group was expected to arrive back on the Sunshine Coast on Wednesday.
“From the outset, our voyage to Russia was about my students, who are a remarkable group of young adults,” MacPherson said. “As their teacher, I am proud of them and how they comported themselves under difficult and constantly changing circumstances. They were excellent ambassadors for our country, community, and school.”
On March 3, days before the students were scheduled to depart, SD46 cancelled all overseas student trips due to COVID-19. Because the Russia trip was organized independently, it went ahead.
“The Board of Education and I are thrilled that all of our students are safely on Canadian soil,” said School District No.46 superintendent Patrick Bocking
