The Ville de Vaudreuil-Dorion announce that its Camp Franco-Fun project has been selected as a finalist in the Culture and Recreation category by the members of the jury for the Union des municipalités du Québec (UMQ) mérite Ovation municipale 2025 award. The project will be presented at the Pavillon de l'innovation municipale, which will be open to visitors at the UMQ conference on 15 and 16 May at the Centre des congrès de Québec.

In all, the jury selected 20 projects from the 124 submitted by municipalities this year. The projects were assessed on the basis of their innovative approach, processes and results; the optimisation and mobilisation of internal and external resources; and the impact of the project on the municipal organisation, the territory and the community.

Offered for the first time in 2022, Camp Franco-Fun is a day camp program designed for allophone children in Vaudreuil-Dorion to enable them to continue developing their French language skills during the summer, through a day camp specially dedicated to them. It is designed to promote social and linguistic integration through leisure activities.

The programme is the result of a collaborative effort between the town, Animation Jeunesse and the Centre de services scolaires des Trois-Lacs. Two other partners joined the project in 2024: Réseaux and the Vaudreuil-Soulanges Children's Foundation. In the summer of 2024, 50 children aged between 5 and 12 benefited from this two-week service.

Vincent Bastien, Director of the Service des loisirs et de la culture, and his team were delighted to learn that the project was a finalist for the Ovation municipale award: ‘This recognition follows on from those we received last June at the Gala Nomina and at the Association québécoise du loisir municipal. We've believed in the impact of this project in the community since its inception, and seeing it shine at provincial level proves once again that we were right to innovate in order to offer such a service to our residents. I'd like to thank everyone who works so hard to make a difference in the lives of our families through Camp Franco-Fun every year’.

‘Camp Franco-Fun is a perfect example of an initiative aimed at developing mechanisms for welcoming, integrating and supporting our residents. In fact, it's one of the objectives behind our policy of living together. Over the years, Vaudreuil-Dorion has undergone significant change. Many of our new residents are immigrants. It is essential for our organisation to participate in the development of a welcoming and inclusive community life.

‘Next May, we will be proud to present this project to our peers from all over Quebec, who will be able to draw inspiration from it to set up similar initiatives in their municipalities. I would like to extend my warmest thanks to all the employees and partners who contributed to the success of the Camp Franco-Fun project’, added Mayor Guy Pilon.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)