Jersey Day intended to buoy Broncos, Humboldt
Schools participate in capital region
TORONTO — When office coordinator Jill Batten dons her 2010 Sidney Crosby Team Canada jersey today, she’ll be honouring more than just the 16 people who perished as a result of a Saskatchewan highway crash.
She’ll be thinking about a 16-year-old classmate who died in a hunting accident when Batten was a high school student in Grand Bank, N.L., and three other young acquaintances who died in two separate highway crashes roughly 10 years later.
Batten, now 38, says she can’t help but think of her own childhood tragedies as she mourns last week’s horrific accident near Tisdale involving the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team, which also injured 13 people.
It’s a big reason she’s heeding the call of a group of British Columbia hockey moms to wear a jersey as a show of solidarity with victims’ families and the small city of Humboldt, Sask.
Thousands of Canadians have pledged online to take part in the so-called Jersey Day, which encourages people to wear a sports jersey, hockey or otherwise.
Jersey Day organizer Jennifer Pinch of Langley wants Humboldt to know it’s not alone.
She’s asking people who wear a jersey to photograph themselves and post it on social media with #jerseysforhumboldt.
Pinch said she expects to see photos from around the world. “We have [support from] people in Holland, England, China, Australia, Hawaii and all across the United States,” Pinch said.
Capital region school districts are on board.
“Like so many other people across the country, we’re shocked and saddened,” Sooke school district superintendent Jim Cambridge said.
“Our hockey academies are very popular programs in our district and we have alumni who have played in other organizations, with some members of the Humboldt Broncos,” he said.
Students and staff want to do something to show they care, Cambridge said.
“Our students, parents, staff and even our bus drivers are all affected, and if anything, this is just a way we can show our support,” he said. “We all just want the families affected to know that even a school district tucked away in the southern corner of the country is here for them.”
Saanich school district superintendent Dave Eberwein said it is open to all schools to take part. He said he and others in the district administration office are wearing jerseys.
“For many people they feel almost helpless, they want to do something and they don’t know what to do,” Eberwein said. “If they can at least show an expression of sympathy by wearing a sports jersey, I think that helps to build community unity, as well.”