{"id":28562,"date":"2021-01-22T00:47:16","date_gmt":"2021-01-22T05:47:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=28562"},"modified":"2021-01-22T00:47:22","modified_gmt":"2021-01-22T05:47:22","slug":"cyfs-acting-captain-wants-to-be-role-model-for-girls-and-boys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/cyfs-acting-captain-wants-to-be-role-model-for-girls-and-boys\/","title":{"rendered":"CYFS Acting Captain wants to be role model for girls and boys"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

She has served as a member of the Central York Fire Services for more than a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a job she loves, serving the community which has become a second home and, earlier this year, Kristy Paterson became a somewhat reluctant trailblazer as the Central York Fire Service\u2019s first female Acting Captain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A historic first, to be sure, but Paterson has a different perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am proud of my accomplishment because I think it is a great position, but I don\u2019t think it is special that I am the first woman,\u201d Patterson tells The Auroran. \u201cI am super happy for everyone who passed the test and was a successful candidate, but I don\u2019t think I should be given any more recognition as the first female because everyone passed the same time. The public doesn\u2019t care, or shouldn\u2019t care, if it is a man or a woman who is responding to [a call], all they really care about is if you can do the job when the time comes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, the Barrie resident wants to be seen as a good role model for all genders, regardless of whether they want to follow in her footsteps to a local fire station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being a fire fighter was not a life-long dream for Patterson. As a student at the University of Toronto, she was a player on their varsity hockey team. Athletics came to her naturally and she focused on kinesiology. In her fourth year, however, a conversation with a firefighter left her pondering a career pivot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt just sounded like a super interesting path to follow,\u201d she says, noting she undertook college training to become a firefighter soon thereafter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It didn\u2019t take long for her to be hired by the CYFS \u2013 and, perhaps most importantly, realize she made the right choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI loved it probably from Day One,\u201d she says. \u201cEvery day is different, you\u2019re always learning. It\u2019s a team environment and everybody works together. You\u2019re constantly learning new things and every shift is different and you don\u2019t know what you\u2019re going to get. You\u2019re not confined to an office; you\u2019re out, you\u2019re helping the community, you\u2019re involved and you\u2019re just helping people. It is a good feeling to be there for the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am super happy to come to work every day and to work with really awesome people just being part of a team and knowing we get to help the towns of Aurora and Newmarket.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently stationed in Aurora, Patterson hopes that in her new role she will continue learning and being there for the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn my new role, I want to be a good role model to not only young girls but young boys as well, that if you work hard, you\u2019re able to achieve it,\u201d she says. If it is something you want, then work hard, take the right schooling and you will be able to do it. I understand the support [stemming from being the CYFS\u2019 first female Acting Captain], but at the same time, why is it special? I am proud of my accomplishment and it didn\u2019t have anything to do with being female. My goal is to just be better every day than I was yesterday. It doesn\u2019t matter if you\u2019re a man or a woman, it is just that you\u2019re capable of doing the job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong>
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

She has served as a member of the Central York Fire Services for more than a decade. It is a job she loves, serving the community which has become a second home and, earlier this year, Kristy Paterson became a somewhat reluctant trailblazer as the Central York Fire Service\u2019s first female Acting Captain. A historic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":28542,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/2021-01-21-03.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-7qG","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-18 06:43:58","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28562"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28562\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}