Students in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., begin returning to class following mass shooting
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TUMBLER RIDGE – Some students headed back to classes in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., on Thursday, just over two weeks after an 18-year-old shooter killed eight people, including six at the local secondary school, before turning the gun on herself.
A message to parents posted on the Peace River South school district website said elementary students were returning to classes with shortened days Thursday and Friday, with regular schedules set to resume Monday.
Portables set up on the elementary school grounds would open for secondary students and their families to visit on Thursday, and those students may attend class for one course on Friday, said the message posted online Wednesday.
It said the “tentative plan” for next week would be for secondary students to go to school from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., but that “may change based on needs.”
The district said a security company has been contracted to maintain a perimeter around the Tumbler Ridge Elementary campus, while RCMP have conducted a security review of the area and a camera system is to be installed.
The message said the two doors on each portable would be locked at all times and the elementary school doors would also be locked throughout the day.
Two “safer school liaison” staff will remain at the site until the spring break, along with a district counselling team, the message said.
Jesse Van Rootselaar shot and killed her mother and half-brother at their home in Tumbler Ridge on Feb. 10, before going to the secondary school and killing five students and an educational assistant, then taking her own life.
The superintendent of the Peace River South school district, Christy Fennell, issued a letter to families on Feb. 13 saying the expectation was that students would not be returning to the school where the mass shooting took place.
The priority would be “emotional and physical safety through a trauma informed lens,” Fennell said in the letter.
The B.C. government announced three days later, on Feb. 16, that portable facilities would be set up for secondary students, after a pledge by Premier David Eby that “not one of you will ever be forced to go back to that school.”
The latest update posted by the district said the secondary school portables will be equipped with a hand-held radio, and if there is a need for an alarm, the portables will receive the same message simultaneously.
The elementary and secondary schools, now located at the same site, will have different start, break and end times to help control traffic, it noted.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 26, 2026.