‘We need to be putting a lot more dollars into school infrastructure’

NWT education minister Caitlin Cleveland says new reports of unsafe lead levels in schools show territory-wide testing is working – but there’s a broader lack of cash to maintain school buildings.

Last week, Dettah’s Kaw Tay Whee School was ordered to stop using its drinking-water fixtures over concerns about elevated lead levels.

Tests found similar issues at three Yellowknife schools earlier in the year.

Cleveland said the Dettah tests were part of a testing program rolled out in response to those initial lead concerns, and were “evidence of our new program working.”

The NWT has not had regular testing of school water for lead until now.

Asked what residents need to know in communities where school water has yet to be tested, the minister said “schools with the greatest risk” were being targeted for tests first.

“I am very much taking this seriously. The safety of students and staff is absolutely paramount and nothing is off the table,” she said.

“We are absolutely committed to the health and safety of residents, especially our youngest residents, and we’ll continue to monitor this program closely.”

More broadly, Cleveland said the teritorial government does not have enough money to stay on top of all the infrastructure work needed at schools in dozens of communities.

She said she funding for smaller projects will increase from $1 million to $5 million per year starting in 2026-27 but “even at $5 million, that only covers 30 percent of the identified needs of small capital projects from schools across the Territories.”

“Those needs that aren’t funded don’t go away year over year. So if we have, you know, 50 projects that go unfunded this year, those projects stay on the books for next year,” said Cleveland.

“You end up with a deficit of capital projects that go unfunded year over year, and they compound on top of one another.

“So I am concerned, to be absolutely honest with you, that we need to be putting a lot more dollars into our school infrastructure.”

Below, read a transcript of our interview with the minister.

The GNWT has a webpage for lead testing in schools that includes a list of schools where testing is taking place next.

As of December 2, Paulatuk’s school had been given the all-clear. Results from November tests at Wekweètì’s school and Yellowknife’s Mildred Hall School were either not yet back or being evaluated, while Ulukhaktok’s school is due for testing on Thursday.

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This interview was recorded on November 27, 2025. The transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Ollie Williams: How do you feel about the situation that’s unfolding here?

Caitlin Cleveland: This really is evidence of our new program working. We prioritized the schools that were at greatest risk and applied the new testing protocol to them first. What we’re seeing is the results of testing the schools that are at the highest level of risk. This is us figuring out what we need to know.

We’re taking swift action. As soon as these results come in, we are able to respond to them right away, prioritizing the health and safety of students and staff, making sure any water source identified that needs to be turned off is turned off, communicating quickly to education bodies, staff, students and families, and then continuing to monitor the results closely.

I made a commitment to residents of this territory that we were going to make sure they received any information we had right away, and that’s what this program is showing.

How do you determine which schools are at the greatest risk? And if there’s an easy way of doing that, why hadn’t we done that earlier?

The Department of Infrastructure is using the age of the infrastructure paired with the age of the students to prioritize those schools. The Department of Infrastructure is our asset maintainer for schools outside Yellowknife. YK1 and YCS own their own infrastructure, whereas all other schools in the Territories are owned by the GNWT, so Infrastructure takes the lead on maintaining those assets.

If you’re a resident living elsewhere in the NWT and your school has not yet gone through this testing, where do you go to find out when that’ll happen?

This is a live program, an evolving program. Information is constantly being updated on the Education, Culture and Employment website. I have asked for the further testing schools to be updated on that website.

If any Infrastructure staff member is travelling into those communities, where appropriate, we’re actually doubling up and moving schools up in the list as we can, to make sure we’re prioritizing this work.

What is your message to residents in communities that haven’t been tested, yet, about what they should know about the water in their kids’ schools and what steps they should be taking, if any?

This is evidence of this new system working. We’re prioritizing schools based on the age of the infrastructure and the age of the children, so making sure we are addressing schools with the greatest risk first.

And what I want residents to know is I am very much taking this seriously. The safety of students and staff is absolutely paramount and nothing is off the table. We are absolutely committed to the health and safety of residents, especially our youngest residents, and we’ll continue to monitor this program closely.

Can people trust the water in schools that haven’t been tested yet? Can they have confidence that that water is OK?

I would have to defer to the experts on advice to residents of that nature.

I rely on the experts over in Infrastructure and the Office of the Chief Public Health Officer, and my focus is ensuring that we’re communicating with families, that we’re taking this seriously, that we’re making sure residents have all the necessary information, and that we’re continuing to make sure we’re communicating quickly moving through this program – and essentially following the program that we laid out, because it’s very clear that it’s working.

Do you think the evidence in front of us now shows that this sort of testing ought to have been taking place years ago, if not decades ago?

I think it shows us we have to make sure we are, first of all, doing testing that is needed in any of our facilities, but that we’re also preparing ourselves to communicate the results of anything that’s done with residents, and having mechanisms and processes to do that. And I think that was one of the biggest lessons learned this year.

As we continue on through this world, it seems to get more and more layered and nuanced and complicated, and so making sure we have those good old-fashioned lines of communication open – and we’re talking to one another – is incredibly important.

I do want to come back to that question. Appreciating you’ve only been the minister since late 2023, should this testing have been happening long, long ago?

Well, I think we saw in other jurisdictions that this testing was happening, and so I don’t think that that is a secret, that we have risks in our communities, and we need to make sure we’re aware of them and we’re prioritizing the health and safety of residents.

OK, I will try one last time. Should it have been happening years ago?

I think that’s a question. Ollie, ultimately, for the chief public health officer who regulates water testing in the Territories.

Sure, but you’re the minister responsible, minister. You are the top dog when it comes to school infrastructure in the NWT right now.

But I’m definitely not the expert on who should test what, when.

For example, we have different testing right now that we’re all monitoring closely as far as wastewater testing right now, and so I think it’s important that I rely on the experts and take the advice of experts, rather than kind-of assuming. I rely on the expert advice of our public servants at the end of the day.

But one of the things I will say as a parent and as a resident is I’m taking this very seriously and making sure we don’t repeat the the mistakes of the past, that we are communicating results.

We are obviously doing this testing now, and this is not a pilot program. This is testing that will endure, because we’re not going to repeat the same mistakes.

What are your views on whether this shows us that the GNWT ought to be directing more of its attention to the maintenance and the improvement of school infrastructure in the Territories? Is that a lesson you’ve learned from this?

This was definitely obvious to me before we ran into this situation: the funding we have for school infrastructure in the Northwest Territories definitely falls short on an annual basis.

Historically, the small capital funding for projects for school infrastructure in the Northwest Territories has sat at just over $1 million a year, and I was able to negotiate increasing that funding to $5 million a year. That change took effect with our approval of the capital budget this year but, even at $5 million, that only covers 30 percent of the identified needs of small capital projects from schools across the Territories. That means a number of projects are unfunded.

I remain concerned about school infrastructure for a multitude of reasons in this territory, and we’re going to see a lot of that infrastructure coming due at the same time.

The other thing I think is important is that those needs that aren’t funded don’t go away year over year. So if we have, you know, 50 projects that go unfunded this year, those projects stay on the books for next year, and so you end up with a deficit of capital projects that go unfunded year over year, and they compound on top of one another.

So I am concerned, to be absolutely honest with you, that we need to be putting a lot more dollars into our school infrastructure.

How do we fix that?

I think we have to look at it from all perspectives, one being based on changes across the country and changes to the North. Are we properly funded in the North for what we need to do?

The other thing is I firmly believe that, as a territory, we also have to work towards being self-sufficient and pursuing opportunities that are very much right in front of us right now.

We’re also working with what we’ve got. Normally, we work to have a school in all three phases of our building phases every single year. This past capital budget, we actually put two schools into phase one, so we’re doubling up and trying to do some catch-up here.

We are making changes that we can afford to do on our own right now, but we still need to really pursue those other pieces and make sure we’re growing this territory in a healthy way.