Jessica Tace Smith OAM is an Australian Paralympic swimmer and motivational speaker.
Smith swam for Australia for seven years and represented Australia at the 2004 Paralympic Games in Athens, Greece.[1]
Smith began working with the Butterfly Foundation as a body image advocate. She now works professionally as an MC, and motivational and public speaker.[2]
Published in July 2015, Little Miss Jessica Goes to School is a children's book written by Smith as a resource for children with a hand or arm difference.[3]
Smith was awarded an OAM in 2019 for service to the community.[4][5]
In 2017 she was awarded a Cosmopolitan Woman of the Year as a Game Changer.[6]
She was named an Emerging Leader by the Australian Government at the Positive Body Image Awards, and received a Pride of Australia Medal in Western Australia. In 2015, she was a state finalist for Young Australian of the Year.
Smith was born without her left forearm. As a young child she sustained serious burns to 15% of her body. In her teens she overcame an eating disorder and depression.[7]
Smith married Hamid Salamati in 2015[8] and has three children.[9] She later converted to her husband's Islam at his family's request.[10]