A mother who lost her teenage son in a tragic crash that also killed other members of a basketball team and a teacher, hopes that a coroner's inquest announced Thursday will bring in standardized rules on how school sports teams travel to events.

Seven students and the teacher died in Bathurst, N.B. as they were travelling back from an out-of-town game on Jan. 12. Their 15-passenger van skidded on an icy highway, entering the centre lane before colliding with an oncoming transport truck. The team was almost home when the crash happened.

"This is for the safety of the children. There has got to be set rules for every school to follow," Isabelle Hains said Thursday. "This is my goal now, to honour my son in this way."

Hains' son, Daniel, died with six other boys — Nathan Cleland, Justin Cormier, Javier Acevedo, Codey Branch, all aged 17 along with Nick Quinn, 16, and Nick Kelly, 15.

Beth Lord, 51, a teacher and the wife of the Bathurst High School boys' basketball coach, also died in the crash.

Wayne Lord, the driver of the van, his daughter Katie and two other team members survived the collision.

The independent inquest by a coroner's jury into the crash will be held in public and hear witness testimony.

The aim is to assess whether the deaths were "overlooked, concealed or ignored," according to a news release from the provincial coroner's office.

New Brunswick's acting coroner, Greg Forestell, said Thursday following a meeting with Hains and other family members of the crash victims that the inquiry will be held in Bathurst and not start until at least April.

It is expected to last for two weeks and will call multiple expert witnesses including RCMP officers and Transport Canada investigators. Forestell said it has not been decided whether the crash survivors will be called to testify.

"There's been a lot of work done by government organizations and a multitude of facts," Forestell said. "We hope that through a coroner's inquest, we can bring those facts together in a cohesive manner."

The parents of those killed will also be asked to suggest recommendations the inquest will make but the proceedings are not meant to assign blame for the deaths, Forestell added.

"It's for the community," he said. "We're going to look at all the facts and decide if there can be recommendations to prevent similar deaths in similar situations."

Hains hopes the inquest will support a new law that will make it mandatory for anyone who drives students to out-of-town events to have a Class 2 driver's licence. This licence allows a driver to operate a bus with more than 24 passengers.

"I'm pleased but nothing will bring me closure," she said, her voice breaking. "I miss my son so much, I would rather have him home. This is not the way I planned my senior life to be. But I'm not pointing fingers at anybody. This tragedy could be prevented from happening again."

A service for the teenage basketball players will be held at a Bathurst church on Jan. 11, to mark the one-year anniversary of their deaths.

Meanwhile, last November, the Crown said it would not press criminal charges against anyone involved in the crash.

An RCMP report released earlier this year found that the van the team was travelling in had faulty brakes, worn ties and a rusted exterior. It would not have passed a safety test in its condition, investigators found.

A subsequent Transport Canada report said Lord, the van's driver, had been awake for 16 hours prior to the collision and at the time, the weather conditions were very poor with the roads being slick with ice.

Six of the eight who were killed were not wearing seatbelts but investigators found that this was not a factor in their deaths.

Since the crash, some provinces have banned 15-passenger vans from transporting students for extracurricular school activities but the majority have left the decision on their usage up to individual schools or school boards.

The crash also sparked other provinces and school boards to review their policies on making snow tires mandatory on vehicles transporting students.

Bathurst is 200 kilometres north of Moncton, N.B.