First Annual Biggs Award

Flowercart presents award to Shawn Biggs

By Lisa Hammett Vaughan
Co-ordinator of Flowercart’s Community Employment Services

On June 15, 2004 at Flowercart’s Annual General Meeting I unveiled a new award that Flowercart will be able to give each year to an individual who exemplifies the work skills taught and supported by Flowercart’s Community Employment Services. At least every month in my work I hear a story about one of our clients who is doing a really great job and who inspires other people around them. I am the sort of person who really likes to tell stories, but of course, because of confidentiality, I am not at liberty to share the details of those stories with other people in the community. So I had an idea that if we invented this prize, then at least once a year we could tell a great story! We really want to let people know about some of the workers considered mentally handicapped whom we have helped to get jobs and who do such a wonderful job that they are excellent role models for others. We also thought it would allow some of our partner employers to acknowledge the way they value the employees we place with them.

So we created the Biggs Award. The Biggs Award is named in honour of Mr. Shawn Biggs.

In 1994, at the age of 23, Shawn was diagnosed with cancer – a brain tumour. He came back to the Valley from Ottawa 6 years ago when the hospital in Ottawa referred him to Halifax where there was a better MRI. Shawn said he felt good about “coming back home” because he had relatives here.

The first thing that almost anyone who meets Shawn would notice is – he is a really friendly and positive person. At Michelin Shawn joined a 4-person work team – the work that they were doing is very routine – they do the same thing for many hours each day. Shawn always speaks positively about his work there. He says that he tried every day to boost his teammates’ spirits and help them all feel positive about their work. Shawn seemed to be a natural leader and his co-workers looked up to him. If they had a problem, they would talk with Shawn, and he took on the role of asking for help from a supervisor when anyone on the team had a problem. In every way he was an excellent role model for everyone around him. In July 2003 Shawn’s specialist told him that his cancer was out of remission and that he was in stage 3 of 4 stages of this form of cancer. He began taking chemotherapy that exhausted him. They said there was a slim chance that the chemo would help. Still Shawn was positive. He said he had beaten the odds for 10 years now, so he wasn’t going to give up. He made arrangements to make up for work time lost when he was travelling back and forth for appointments in Halifax every week. And he would arrive at work eager to perform his tasks – some days in spite of the fact that he had spent the night throwing up from the chemotherapy. He didn’t make a secret of his cancer, but he also didn’t make a big deal of it. He always told me he would let me know if he couldn’t work. And one day in December 2003 Shawn phoned and said that he just couldn't do it anymore.  His fingers were beginning to curl in from using them at work everyday.  They were getting weaker everyday.  Shawn said that the chemo was getting too much for him right then, taking all the energy he had.  He felt so bad about letting us and Michelin down but he knew he just couldn’t continue anymore. He said he was so sorry to do this to us because he said we had been so good to him.  He told us he wanted to work out the week and have Friday as a normal day and tell the guys to have a great weekend and then Monday if we could let the guys know he was gone.  He was very appreciative of all we had done and said he hoped to someday come back.

Well, you will be happy to know that Shawn didn’t get worse! He got stronger and put some weight back on. He planned his wedding; and in June 2004 he got married.

I guess it is probably pretty obvious to you now why we wanted to name our award in honour of Shawn Biggs. When I think of Shawn, I think how much dignity he has. He is a man with a great deal of dignity – a fine role model for us all - and I was very proud and happy to present Shawn with the first annual Biggs Award.