Displaced Ukrainian White Pines student personifies resilience

Just one month before the current school year began, a teenager from Ukraine first stepped foot in Sault Ste. Marie and, in just a couple of months, has managed to inspire many with his positive attitude and leadership.

Currently 17 years old, Yehor Netecha is a Grade 12 student at White Pines Collegiate and Vocational School in Sault Ste. Marie.

One year ago he, his mother and younger brother fled Ukraine shortly after Russia invaded the country.

At the beginning of the conflict, Yehor and his family helped out where they could in volunteer centres in his hometown of Dnipro. After only a couple of weeks his father, who was forced to stay behind, recognized the invasion was going to get worse before it got better.

“I don’t know how he knew but he could see it,” said Yehor about his father’s gut instinct.

Along with his brother and mother, Yehor crossed the border into neighbouring Poland, where he lived and worked for six months.

Looking for a longer-term solution, Yehor suggested the three settle in a different country.

“I just said to my mom what do you think about Canada because they are English language and I studied English for school since first grade,” he said. “After my mom spoke to my father we decided to apply for the [Canadian] visa.”

Ukrainians fleeing the war are not technically classified in Canada as refugees, but are allowed to fast-track into this country through the Canada-Ukraine authorization for emergency travel. It allows Ukrainians to work, study and stay in Canada for up to three years.

Minus the father, his family found a host family in Sault Ste. Marie through a Facebook group dedicated to resettling people from Ukraine and in mid-August the three set foot in Sault Ste. Marie for the first time.

Moving schools can be stressful for any teenager, but Yehor found himself in a whole new country speaking a language he wasn’t fluent in and trying to navigate the course selection for his Grade 12 year.

“I didn’t understand the education system here because in Ukraine we can’t choose our courses, we studied every course at the same time, but we have one lesson for 45 minutes and we have like 20 subjects per year we study at the same time,” he said. “In two weeks I understood what courses I wanted and chose them and it was a pretty good schedule. But for the first two weeks I didn’t understand what was going on.”

Yehor was originally enrolled as an English Language Learner but after demonstrating his relatively strong English skills was placed in mainstream classes.

He has noticed a few differences.

“Maybe it was my school in Ukraine, but here biology was harder than in Ukraine, but math here is much easier than in Ukraine,” said Yehor.

Accustomed to a small school back in Ukraine, Yehor said he felt like he was living in a Hollywood movie set in the kind of high school he had only seen on the big screen.

“It was like a picture from movies about western countries and their culture, with yellow buses and high school sports and other things,” he said. “It was awesome and a totally different way of life here.”

Yehor said he was more shy when he lived in Ukraine, but became much more social early in this school year and even joined the senior boy’s basketball team.

“I started talking to guys and asking them about activities in school and made friends from different classes,” he said. “Everybody here in Canada are so open and always smiling and open to help.”

Alysia Mitchell was Yehor's English teacher in the first semester. He said she encouraged him to share his story about his family’s journey to the Sault.

“She was really interested about Ukraine and said maybe you should organize a fundraiser, I said yes it was a good idea,” said Yehor. 

He took on the task of organizing a 'teachers versus students' volleyball game and other activities, with proceeds going to his former school in Dnipro, which is currently functioning as volunteer centre where people can get food and help.

Yehor asked his music teacher Greg MacLachlan to perform during the fundraiser.

“We have done things like that before, but I was impressed that a student organized it,” said MacLachlan about the fundraiser, which raised $700. “He did it for something that is close to his heart, he went out and spoke and thanked the student body — showing humility and thanking them for supporting his people and his family. It was just a very impressive thing for a young 17-year-old to do .”

This semester, Yehor is in MacLachlan’s Leadership class, a relatively new course to White Pines designed to teach Grade 12 students critical planning, organizational and collaboration skills as they approach graduation.

“He has a really positive energy about him,” said MacLachlan about Yehor. “He is always positive in class, despite being through some hard times. He just seems to approach life with a zest that is kind of contagious in class.”

The Leadership class is in the middle of organizing an upcoming pep rally to celebrate a number of recent athletics accomplishments at the school, including a OFSAA gold in wrestling for Nevaeh Pine, as well as a NOSSA gold for the boy’s curling team.

Yehor will also take part in the pep rally as a member of the basketball team, which recently competed at NOSSA.

Basketball is a popular sport in Ukraine, said Yehor, but schools don’t compete against each other the same way they do here in North America.

On the court he once again felt like his life was part of a Hollywood script.

“It’s absolutely unbelievable, it was like in the movies,” he said. “We didn’t have a really good season because this year was rebuilding, but I will never forget it, it was fascinating — the emotions.”

Senior boys basketball coach Joey Brock said Yehor showed up for tryouts with good athleticism and good skills, but it was his attitude that made him stand out.

“He could go out and give you that energy to try and get something going for you, whether it was two minutes or five minutes, a quarter,” said Brock. “His attitude really never changed, he was just happy to get out there.”

“That’s even how he was at practice, always gave 100 per cent. He always wanted to run,” he added.

Although Yehor was quiet at first, Brock said that didn’t last long.

”As the season went on you could see he enjoyed himself and made a lot of friends and became a part of the team,” he said. “The kids took him in. He is a really good kid.”

Yehor hopes to graduate this year and move on to Sault College’s Business Administration program.

“I have a job, I am working. I am trying to succeed in this country," said Yehor.

MacLachlan said Yehor is offering everyone a great lesson in resilience.

“To see someone like that persevering and staying positive after going through some trauma and seeing his family spread apart and still doing awesome — he is contributing to the school and doing sports — it’s a good lesson for all of us that we can be resilient against the thing life throws at you,” said MacLachlan. “He’s an awesome role model to have at the school, for sure.”