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TUKTOYAKTUK
John Stuart has made a career out of improving the lives of Tuktoyaktuk's youth simply by making a job out of what he loves.

John Stuart Jr. led the Tuktoyaktuk wrestling team as coach to the Territorial Wrestling Championships in Yellowknife this year. - Derek Neary/NNSL photo

Stuart's volunteer work with youth turned into paid work five years ago, when the Hamlet of Tuktoyaktuk was looking for a recreation co-ordinator to run the Jacobson Youth Centre. With almost a decade of coaching experience under his belt at the time, Stuart leaped at the opportunity to make a rewarding career move.

"I had quite a few years coaching youth with wrestling, soccer, volleyball, and a few other sports," said Stuart. "I just thought all the youth here in Tuk already knew me through that aspect. I thought, 'Maybe I'll run the youth centre and continue trying to help them.'"

As a recreation co-ordinator, Stuart was responsible for allocating funding to various programs and administering the programs at the youth centre on a day-to-day basis.

Stuart, 52, had spent 10 years prior to coaching as an athlete and wrestler. He knew first-hand the benefits sports provide youth growing up through tough teenage years.

"Sports contribute a lot to youth by giving them something to do, something to relieve some of their stress or anger," he said. "Just to keep them busy and not going out and doing, you know, the bad things that usually come with being bored or having nothing to do."

Previously, Stuart worked for the Northern Transportation Company Limited (NTCL) but found the required six months per year away from his family to be too much. He began looking for a job in his own town and thought the recreation co-ordinator was a perfect fit.

"I didn't like being away from family for six months at a time out of the year," he said. "I made the switch to find a job here in town. I have a son who is in teenage years now and I find that spending a lot of time with him is really rewarding."

Three months ago Stuart stepped down from his role as recreation co-ordinator to pursue his interest in local politics and opened the position to someone who could commit full-time.

He currently serves on the Tuktoyaktuk hamlet council, is a director on the Tuktoyaktuk Community Corporation, and does occasional work for the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation. His commitment to youth in Tuktoyaktuk and the NWT is still central to his work, however.

"I find (working in local politics) really, really good because there is more ways I can get things for the youth," he said. "I can get a lot more stuff done for the youth, bring a youth aspect to these boards and corporations."

Stuart finds his work incredibly rewarding and said the best thing young people can do as they enter the workforce is to think long and hard about what kind of job will give them the kind of life they want.

"If they're graduating, I'd let them have a long look at the possibilities that they can get into and whatever makes them happy ... going off to post-secondary school or choosing a career right when they get out of high school," said Stuart. "Just let them think really hard on what they want to do for the rest of their life."

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