HIGH ACHIEVERS: Jules-Léger athletes with visually impairments earn 7 medals, 2 team titles at OFSAA track and field championships

By Martin Cleary

When Nathalie Mousseau arrived at the Consortium Centre Jules-Léger three years ago, she made an immediate impact.

An active athlete in many sports as well as a French teacher, she proposed introducing a competitive sports program for the French-language school, which specializes in teaching children with severe learning disabilities or who have hearing- and/or visual-impairment issues.

Her first year served as an introductory period for the sports program, seeing how many students in Grades 2-12 would be interested in learning about a handful of sports and developing their skills.

As the third year of the program winds down later this month, Léger experienced its most successful season in track and field at the OFSAA provincial high school championships last weekend in Toronto.

The three-athlete team of Liên Nhân and Latifa Mbianga Tchamabong in the girls’ visually-impaired division and Jacob Gauthier in the boys’ visually-impaired division combined to win three gold and four silver medals in as many discipline finals. Their results also allowed Léger to capture the girls’ and boys’ team point championships.

When Léger made its debut at the OFSAA track and field championships in 2024, Nhân and Gauthier competed in only one event each. But they scored first-place finishes in their 100-metre races in almost identical times of 15.81 seconds and 15.53 seconds respectively.

“I started the program three years ago when I was hired, because I do a lot of sports,” said Mousseau, who moved to Ottawa from London, where she was a Grade 8 French teacher. “I decided to involve the kids and show them they can do it.

“I’ve learned about adaptation and I train with them. It has been fun. They keep going. It’s good for their mental health. Kids need to move. It’s important to do.”

There are 13 high school and elementary students active in the after-school sports program. The high school students train and compete in cross-country running, nordic skiing and track and field in separate para divisions. The elementary students also compete at cross-country and track and field meets with able-bodied athletes.

Besides being active as a runner and a cyclist in mountain biking and cyclo-cross, Mousseau also is a certified para nordic coach and volunteers with the Nakkertok Nordic Ski Club.

“We started gradually. They were a bit nervous,” Mousseau said about the predictable beginning for the Léger sports program. “I said, ‘If you trust me, things will go well; you’ll just keep improving.’”

Once the student-athletes developed confidence in learning various athletic skills, they started to feel more comfortable in training and competing. Léger, which is 45 years old and located on Lanark Avenue in Ottawa’s west end, doesn’t have proper sports training sites like other high schools, but Mousseau has taken a creative approach to coaching her student-athletes.

She has written individual training programs for each student-athlete, which they work on twice a week at home. Their other training session is held at Louis-Riel high school, when the dome is available. The dome is temporarily closed because a winter storm damaged the outside covering.

“At the beginning, when the kids did sports, they were accompanied by adults,” said Annie Duchesneau, a vice-principal at Léger’s provincial school for students who are deaf, blind/low vision or deafblind. “But it was important that they had someone guide them who was the same age.”

Léger formed a partnership with Louis-Riel, where the Léger student-athletes were guided through training and competing with a Riel student. Five Riel students were recruited to serve as guides and three attended competitions for this spring’s track and field season.

“It’s great the kids are so involved. They really enjoyed being guides. Every year we get more and more guides,” Mousseau added.

“It’s exciting and rewarding. It creates a good friendship between the students.”

When the Léger student-athletes visited Louis-Riel, they also received valuable instruction from experienced Riel teacher-coach Maude Carrier-Laforte.

In three years, Mousseau said her student-athletes have made “humongous progress.”

“It’s emotional for every race. It’s great to see them confident and dealing with stress and results. It’s really rewarding. They are so grateful to do this and excited to do it every time,” Mousseau explained.

Nhân provided plenty of excitement at the OFSAA championships, winning the girls’ visually-impaired 100 metres in 16.14 seconds and the shot put at 5.85 metres. Like her teammates, Nhân qualified for OFSAA through the National Capital Secondary School Athletic Association west conference and city championship meets and the OFSAA East regional championships.

“She’s really driven,” Mousseau said about Nhân. “She wants to win, wants badly to win. She has such a good personality, smiling all the time.

“She does everything I tell her to do. She makes it easier for everyone and the stress goes down for everyone.”

Mbianga Tchamabong only enrolled at Léger in February, but was eager to join the track and field team. At OFSAA, she placed second to Nhân in the 100 metres in 17.63 seconds and the shot put at 5.51 metres.

“She has never been involved in sports, but wanted to do track and field,” Mousseau said. “She was so excited and so proud of her medals.”

Gauthier increased his competitive workload at OFSAA to three events from one last year. He tied for first place in the boys’ visually-impaired shot put at 6.84 metres with Samuel Schreiter of Huron Park and finished second in the 100 metres at 15.50 seconds and the 800 metres at 3:01.02.

“There’s not a lot of disciplines because there aren’t enough kids registered (for events),” Mousseau said. “He decided to do all (three events) … and he did really well. He gave it his all, when he raced.”

When Nhân, Mbianga Tchamabong and Gauthier celebrated their medal performances along with their medal-winning guides, Mousseau watched with sheer joy and happiness.

“It’s always very emotional,” she admitted. “I was so happy, tearful and emotional at the same time. I wanted to make sure all was perfect for them. It was so beautiful. It worked out.”

When a school wins a team points title in the boys and girls’ novice, junior and senior divisions, OFSAA presents it with a large championship banner. OFSAA, however, doesn’t give championship banners to the top para teams in the visually impaired, ambulatory, intellectually impaired or wheelchair divisions. But Mousseau said she’s working on correcting that irregularity.

Léger won the boys and girls’ visually-impaired team point titles at the 2024 OFSAA championships and printed its own banners to hang in a prominent place in the school. The school will do the same this year as its track and field and sports program continues to build momentum.

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