'This is cold': P.E.I. mother upset over decision to remove late daughter's photos from school memorial wall

A high school on Prince Edward Island is removing pictures of its late students from a memorial wall – a decision that has upset one mother whose daughter attended the school.

Valerie Wadman’s daughter Miranda graduated from Kensington Intermediate Senior High School in 1997 and went on to study at the University of Prince Edward Island.

She died in a car accident on March 1, 1998, at the age of 18.

“She was very special to a lot of people. We had professors come to the wake and tell us that when she walked into a room, she lit it up. She was only there from September to March,” Wadman told CTV Atlantic.

When she got the email from the school explaining their decision, she thought it was “cold.”

“Why? I couldn’t understand the meaning of it, and I read where it says that it’s upsetting, it could upset children. I thought, I don’t understand that. It’s been there for so long and we kind of rely on going there and seeing it,” Wadman says.

“And I didn’t want to be nasty, but I wanted him to understand … it seemed cold, what he was telling me. Just matter-of-fact. So, I thought about it, and two weeks later I sent the email back. It was short. I just wanted him to know how I felt, my feelings about the whole thing. I thought I deserved an answer, some reasoning or something, don’t just tell me it’s upsetting children. What does that mean?”

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Wadman says she wanted people to know how hurt she was by the decision.

“There’s 17 pictures on the wall and I didn’t see anything that anybody else had said, and I assumed they all got the same email, and I thought I’m going to go ahead and I’m going to say how I feel and it upsets me and it’s not right.”

Miranda won two scholarships when she graduated – money she told her mother she would give back someday. Wadman says, after her daughter’s funeral, they set up a scholarship at the Credit Union and every year they give out $500 in her name.

“I hope my great-grandson will be able to give it out someday, that’s my hope. So that’s why I say I want this to go on and I want people to see who she was, not just a name on a piece of paper, not the scholarship,” she says.

Wadman says she doesn’t understand how the photos could hurt somebody.

“They’re not meant to hurt anybody, and it doesn’t say how these poor people died. I don’t understand that. I mean, if underneath it said suicide or drug overdose or whatever, maybe that could upset somebody, but they don’t do that. And the family just wants to honour their children,” she says.

Wadman made a Facebook post expressing her feelings about the decision. It has received hundreds of comments and more than 1,000 shares.

“I have gotten emails and comments from people in Whitehorse, Yukon. Like, that just blows me away. Australia, there’s a lady in Australia who sent me a message this morning. It affects a lot of people, not just here, not just our community because we’re well-known, it’s the subject of it. It hurts more people than it’s ever going to hurt in the school,” she says.

Registered psychologist Simon Sherry says loss is a normal experience and it is OK to expose children to death and dying in a “developmentally appropriate way.”

“Exposure to difficult and uncomfortable emotions is necessary to develop resilience. In overprotecting kids, we deprive them of the opportunity to learn to cope. This can have serious consequences later in life when students realize they do not have the skills needed when challenges inevitably arise,” says Sherry.

"Perhaps removing the memorials might shield a handful of students from dwelling on painful losses, but the underlying lesson the school board's decision is teaching its student body is: avoid normal parts of life if they are difficult or uncomfortable."

Sherry adds, avoidance can encourage unhealthy thought patterns and behaviours.

“It can result in students feeling incapable, anxious, and depressed,” he said.

Wadman says she wants the pictures put back up on the wall, even if she has to put them there herself.

“Everybody that I know that has lost a child and has a scholarship in that school stops and looks. And there’s a lady that was a janitor that just retired, her son’s picture is on the wall, she never left work without stopping and looking at it,” she says. “And she told me that, she sent me a message and told me that. This young man happened to be in Miranda’s graduating class and he was killed in a car accident … now she said it’s a blank wall. Why? I can’t get a reason from anybody – a good reason.”

Wadman points to a memorial in Kensington, P.E.I., that honours a late teenager named Alysha Toombs, who also died in a car accident.

“It makes me think, where does this stop? Like where does this stop? People will see that, you drive by it every day, it’s right there almost in the rink parking lot, where kids go,” she says. “You should be teaching your children about life, not sheltering them trying to hide everything. You can’t hide everything.”

Sherry says lessons taught to students extend beyond what they learn in the classroom.

“What better place to teach students about resilience and emotional maturity? Memorials offer a reminder to cherish those around us, to be kind, to not drink and drive, and so on,” he says.

“Instead of removing memorials to protect students from feeling painful emotions, the better solution would be to teach them how to handle these emotions.”

The province’s Public Schools Branch says it has begun work to provide guidance around memorials at P.E.I. schools.

“We understand this can be a sensitive subject as we have all experienced loss. The PSB will be seeking feedback on draft procedures which are based on recommendations from the National Association of School Psychologists and are in line with neighbouring provinces. The feedback period will begin on Monday, December 2, 2024,” it said in a post on social media.

Minister of Education and Early Years Rob Lantz said he has “no idea” where the decision came from when the topic was brought up in the legislature on Tuesday.

“I’ve asked my staff in the department, who apparently don’t know where it’s come from either. It seems like a solution in search of a problem. I honestly can’t understand what we’re trying to achieve by this. And it seems as though we’re going out of our way to make sure children don’t encounter anything unpleasant in this life … I mean, if we’re trying to create resilience in children, which of course we are, there’s going to be obstacles, there’s going to be unpleasant situations, we can’t remove everything,” he said.

“I realize that people are outraged and so I’m going to look into it and see what we can do about it.”

Lantz also wrote a letter to the Public Schools Branch Thursday to express his concerns.

“Considering that these procedures are currently in unapproved draft form and PSB has signaled its intention to hold public consultation on them, I would respectfully ask for PSB to instruct their schools to immediately stop the removal of, and reinstate memorials until after policies and procedures have been fully considered and feedback is received from all stakeholders, including students, staff, parents, and the broader community,” he said.

For more Prince Edward Island news visit our dedicated provincial page.