After being separated from their group and spending a cold night on the Bruce Peninsula National Park, a group of 15 students from a Waterloo, Ont., high school has returned home safely.

The students -- all 16 and 17-year-olds -- spent nearly 12 hours alone on the southern Ontario hiking trail overnight Thursday after disappearing around 5 p.m. while on a school hiking trip.

The youths were found around 5:30 a.m. this morning by an OPP Emergency Response Team. All were reported to be in “good” condition, if a little cold.

The students all attend Saint David Catholic Secondary School in Waterloo, about a three-hour drive south of Bruce Peninsula.

“Something went awry and we want to make sure that we mitigate that … and make sure that this does not happen again,” said Dave Desantis, Superintendent of Learning with the Waterloo Catholic District School Board (WCDSB).

He added that one student told him “everything was fine.”

The class trip was made up of a group of 30 students and three supervisors, meaning about half of the students ended up being separated from the main group.

“It was cold last night, as we know,” said the WCDSB’s John Shewchuk. “And yeah, you could say that they got a little more than they bargained for.

“We’re really concerned about how they became separated in the first place. That’s the obvious thing that we need to get to the bottom of,” he added.

Although some of the students owned cellphones, they were not allowed to take them on the hike, which was intended to emphasis outback camping and survival skills.

As a result, police said there were no concerns about the teens spending the night outdoors.