CAREER HIGHLIGHTS
Career Noralie Jackett was an outstanding athlete who had an even bigger impact on athletics in Chatham off
the playing field.
She attended Queen Mary elementary, John McGregor Secondary and Chatham Collegiate Institute,
where as a Cougar won two Kent County girls singles badminton championships (1963) and also
played on championship basketball teams.
After attending the University of Western Ontario, Noralie returned to CCI where she taught and
coached from 1967-74, guiding Cougars teams to 14 Kent County championships in basketball and
badminton.
Noralie coached in all three seasons, as many as nine teams a year, in an era where all girls high school
teams were coached by women
She coached all three girls basketball teams (midget, junior and senior) and cross-country in the fall,
both girls volleyball teams (junior and senior) and girls gymnastics in the winter, girls track and field
along with girls and boys badminton in the spring.
Under Noralie, the Senior Cougars won six Kent County basketball championships, including
five in a row from 1971-74, along with SWOSSAA championships in 1970, 1973 and & 1974 at a time
when #39 was the highest level. Her Cougars also won an All-Ontario silver medal in 1974, one year
before girls basketball became a sanctioned OFSAA sport.
Her teams also won two Kent County junior and one midget basketball titles.
Four track and field athletes – Elaine Hinnegan (2), Chris Walker (3), Mary Jane Malo and Andrea
Charles – won Kent County age group championships while Walker won three consecutive Quigley
Awards as the top female athlete of the meet.
Noralie's combined girls and boys badminton teams won five consecutive overall Kent County
championships, including 1973 when CCI players won all five individual divisions.
But even more impressive than her number of winning teams was Noralie's championing for equality in
female athletics.
Noralie introduced spring and summer basketball leagues for girls in 1969, which was previously
exclusive to boys, and also organized the first Chatham Jaycee Pink White senior girls basketball
tournament in 1973, to give girls the same tournament experience as the Jaycee Blue White boys.
Noralie organized the 1974 unofficial All-Ontario girls basketball tournament, with 14 associations
represented, as her Cougars finished second.
OFSAA recognized Noralie's efforts and made girls basketball a sanctioned sport in 1974-75.
Noralie was also one of the few female teachers who served as a convenor at that time, as she convened
Kent, SWOSSAA and OFSAA basketball, Kent and SWOSSAA badminton.
Noralie left Chatham to teach in London and Middlesex and coached the Western Mustangs women's
basketball team for four seasons (1975-79).
In 1990, Noralie produced two award-winning instructional badminton videos and wrote a basketball
book (Basketball Instructor Manual) to help coaches with their teaching of basketball.
Noralie was inducted into the CCI Athletic Alumni Hall of Fame in 1998 and received the Pete Beach
OFSAA Award in 2016.