On June 12, Linda Thickett of Fort Smith, Northwest Territories, and formerly of Canora, received a national award in recognition of her work with disabled individuals.
The award was presented during a special ceremony in Yellowknife.
While visiting with family and friends in the Canora area last week, Thickett said that the award was a great honour to receive. She has been working with individuals with special needs for about 35 years and it has been rewarding.
“Special needs people have been part of my life for as far back as I can remember,” she said. The work has been rewarding because she has also learned from her clients.
“They taught me so much. The children that touched my life have taught me to be a more compassionate, empathic person.”
Thickett lived in Canora from 1979 to 2009. She was an educational assistant for the Good Spirit School Division for 20 years and for 10 years, she worked in the Parkland Early Childhood Intervention (parent aid) program.
In 2009, she planned to retire, but that lasted for a rather short period. After being away from the workplace for about six months, she was drawn back. She moved to the Northwest Territories and began working with children with special needs through the Northwest Territories Disabilities Council in the Yellowknife and Forth Smith areas. Fort Smith became her home where she works with two boys with tourette syndrome.
As with so many of the other causes that she has been involved with throughout her life, Thickett became involved at all levels. When nominating her for the award, the Northwest
Territories Disability Council made note of her work with the Trek for Tourette, the only national fundraiser for tourette syndrome. She brought the national event to Fort Smith. It was just one
of several programs that she started to assist people living with tourette syndrome.
For the people in the Canora area that knew Thickette from her years living in the community, many will recall her dedication to the bone marrow donor program. Shortly after registering with the program, her profile came up as a match for an anonymous stranger needing the life-saving transplant.
Without hesitation, she put her life on hold for the period needed for the procedure and convalescence.
Volunteering for her community has always been important to Thickett and it was a life lesson she found important to teach her children, Alden and Lani Siminoff. She volunteered for the food
bank with the Lioness Club and she worked for the animal shelter program through the United Church board.
She participated in the Relay For Life events to raise money for cancer research and she has always been a promoter of events related to the annual Disability Awareness Week.
Working with people with disabilities is a commitment that often requires support from the worker’s family, Thickett said. She often gives her son Alden credit for having faith in her and inspiring her to work in this field many years ago.
She also gives much credit to “Grandma Polly Siminoff” (95 years old), who was “always there for support along our journey.”
Thicket says 2015 has already been “a very rewarding year for me” and this award makes it even more special. It has been a rewarding year because her daughter Lani had a baby, Beau Charles Martin, on May 12 and he is Thickett’s first grandchild. The year even started off with a bang when she won an all-expenses paid trip to Mexico.
