Over the last several years, Chris Crooks, a Nunavut resident and local wrestling coach, has stepped up as a leader and a mentor to the youth in the area by teaching them not just wrestling, but essential life skills and a safe open space to talk through life’s troubles.
Back in 2018, Cambridge Bay’s wrestling community took a hit when key leaders in the club suddenly left. To keep the wrestling community going, Chris Crooks stepped up as a coach and a leader in the community, assuring that the youth in the area would not lose wrestling.
Very quickly as a coach, Chris realized that wrestling isn’t just a sport – it quickly became a way to teach vital life skills and help the youth. His role as a coach grew to teaching, wrestling, and helping with life skills and mental health. Chris has been helping the youth of Cambridge Bay and surrounding areas build the strength to cope with life’s challenges. As the club gained momentum, Crooks managed to secure more funding, which allowed them to expand their reach.
The opportunity to take youth wrestlers to camps across Canada was a particularly pivotal moment. One of these camps, held in July, brought together 20 wrestlers and 8 coaches from five Nunavut communities for a week in Rocky Mountain House, Alberta. For Crooks, this wasn’t just about training young athletes—it was about preparing the next generation of coaches to give back to their communities. The goal was to ensure that local leaders would continue the work long after they stopped competing.
Chris also uses these camps as a platform to teach practical life skills. The youth are taught not just wrestling, but also personal finances, grocery shopping, and important health topics like family planning, substance abuse, and mental health. These lessons, woven into the camp’s experience, have given the young athletes essential tools to navigate challenges in their communities and lives. It has also provided a safe space for difficult conversations, where they could discuss their cultural identity and express their emotions without fear of judgment.
The camps were intentionally structured to provide not only training in wrestling but emotional support as well. Chris often found that the toughest moments came when participants grappled with grief from the loss of friends or family members. For many, the realization that they could not share their achievements with loved ones back home was a very sad thought. In these moments, the camps offered a therapeutic environment, where youth could process their feelings and receive the mentorship and recognition they needed, filling a once-empty spot in their hearts.
What Chris Crooks has done for the Cambridge Bay community is nothing short of amazing and heartwarming. He is doing a service to the youth of this community that has a profound impact and will be with them for the rest of their lives, teaching them about essential life skills that are difficult to find elsewhere and allowing them to speak openly about the grief and problems they have faced in their lives.
Source: Nunavut News
