A Yellowknife woman has won the Royal Canadian Air Force Reserve Junior NCM Award, an annual honour recognizing a deserving non-commissioned member.
A non-commissioned member is anyone enrolled in the Canadian Armed Forces other than an officer. The award is for “hard work, dedication, leadership by example, dress, deportment and achievements.”
In a press release on Wednesday, the Royal Canadian Air Force named the 2022 winner as Corporal Taylor Major, an aviation systems technician at 440 Transport Squadron in Yellowknife.
Cpl Major is responsible for quality assurance and aircraft maintenance on the squadron’s Twin Otters. She received the award at a presentation in Yellowknife earlier this month.
The RCAF said Major, in the shop at 440 Squadron since 2015, had switched from regular to reserve force to remain in Yellowknife.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
“I loved raising a family here and I knew we wanted to stay,” she was quoted as saying. “The Air Reserve presented the opportunity to make that happen … The opportunities that exist in Yellowknife don’t exist elsewhere. We are a capital city. I’ve never lived in a city where you can walk to a farmers’ market or restaurants. We are downtown, but we also live on a lake.”
The RCAF said Major has founded the Yellowknife Young Parents Program to help pregnant high school students and those close to them.
“I had my first daughter when I was 17,” said Major, who had the benefit of a similar program at the time.
“I wouldn’t have graduated high school if this program didn’t exist for me. I graduated on time with my class.”
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
The program is currently fundraising to create a daycare for young parents who are also students.
She has also been selected for the Canadian Armed Forces Running Nationals, having run her first marathon in October last year.
The RCAF said her “exemplary professionalism, squadron and community involvement and academic advancement reflect favourably upon herself, 440 Transport Squadron, Team North and the Canadian Armed Forces. She continues to be an inspiration to others and personifies the vision of what we desire in a CAF member.”
