Students at Winnipeg schools joined thousands of others across Canada on Thursday by wearing sports jerseys or green and yellow clothing to show support for those affected by last week's Humboldt Broncos tragedy.
Sixteen people have died and 13 were injured after a bus taking the junior hockey team to a playoff game was involved in a collision with a semi-trailer on a highway near Tisdale, Sask., early Friday evening.
Earlier this week, a handful of hockey moms in B.C. called for a national "Jersey Day" on social media, as a tribute to the families of the bus crash victims, asking people to wear a sports jersey on Thursday.
- B.C. hockey moms organize Jersey Day for April 12 in support of Broncos families
- Canadians don hockey jerseys in show of solidarity with Humboldt
Sargent Park School, home of the Flames, happens to share the same jersey colours as the Broncos — green and yellow.
"I think the fact that our school colours linked with [the Broncos] … even increased the empathy the students had, and the pride in supporting our school, but also supporting the families of those children," said Sargent Park principal Luba Krosney.
Hundreds of the school's students wore jerseys or green clothing to take part in Jersey Day. They also made time during an assembly to celebrate the school's basketball team to pay tribute to the victims of the crash and their families with a few words and a moment of silence.
Students at the school, from nursery to Grade 9, collected money to contribute to the GoFundMe account set up for the families of the victims — a fund which had raised more than $9.8 million by Thursday afternoon.
Grade 9 student Lance Soriaga helped organize the Sargent Park event and said he was inspired to do something at his school for the Broncos after seeing the Jets pay tribute to the team last Saturday.
"Sixteen people is a lot of people, considering the fact that most of them were younger than 25 years old," said Soriaga.
"At the school we do trips every year to Edmonton, which is farther than what they were going to travel, and we go on a similar bus."
Younger students also wanted to pay their respects. One class covered the door of their classroom with green and yellow paper hearts for the team.
"So we could show our respect to them, for the people that passed away," said Luc Ferreira, one of the Grade 4 students who helped with the door.
"It's just sad because if it was Sargent Park … if my hockey team that I'm on were on a bus and 16 of them died, it would make me sad. Like, really sad," he said.
Helps students process
Krosney said it's difficult to discuss the tragedy with students, but says teachers did their best to listen and answer questions.
She says allowing the students time to take part in activities and wear the team colours helps students process how they feel.
"Doing something like this helps the kids feel like they can help in some way … having some action where they feel they can contribute in a positive way to support the families," said Krosney.
"It's really nice that we're able to wear the colours to represent our school but also to show that our hearts are connected to the families and the students that were lost on this trip," she said.
Krosney said students were inspired by seeing other events happening across the country, and felt compelled to hold an event of their own.
"I think it's really neat that the whole country is uniting to support the [people affected by the] tragedy and I think it's helping us all feel the pain, but working together to overcome it as a whole country," she said.