Rheal Gagnon is a new candidate in the upcoming elections for DSFM school trustee.

Gagnon has always been a very active member in his community, long before deciding to run in the election.

He has been a member of the La Broquerie Fire Department for the past 30 years, as well as a member of the LUD of La Broquerie for the past 12 years.  

Gagnon has also been a member of the Ste Anne Hospital fund for the past five years.

He used to be a member of Saint Jean Baptiste Days for 10 years, five of which he was president for, and he was also president of the fundraising committee for CPEF.

Gagnon has been working at Tetrault Transport for the past 22 years. His children also attend school in La Broquerie. 

“I'm a father of three kids, all three go to French school in La Broquerie at the École Saint-Joachim. My wife is a teacher there.” 

One of the reasons Gagnon chose to run in the election is because the French language is very important to him. 

“I have that really at heart. I want to make sure that our kids continue to speak French even outside of class and in the community.” 

He also wants all of the children to have access to quality education. 

“I want to bring my voice to the School Trustee committee and I'm willing to work as a team so all the kids have an equal chance to have quality education in the DSFM.” 

Gagnon is looking forward to bringing new ideas to the committee. One of these ideas is to have a bit of training for teachers' aides to equip them to work better with children who have special needs.

He says there is not a lot of training in that area, so he wants to have Université de Saint-Boniface come in and train them for a few days. 

“Just to help them out in different ways that they can bring new programs and bring you new ideas on how to help those kids develop into productive members in the community later on in life.” 

Gagnon believes there is a misconception regarding who is eligible to vote.

He says voting is open to parents with children in French school, as well as grandparents, and people who went to French school many years ago

“That is a big must. That we need more people to come out and vote and participate in democracy.” 

He encourages everybody to go out and vote on Wednesday, October 26.