Métis inventor Dylan Smart of Langham is one of the Order of Gabriel Dumont Award recipients in the bronze category for 2020. (Angela Brown/battlefordsNOW Staff)

By Angela Brown

Celebrating success

Métis inventor from Langham recognized with Order of Gabriel Dumont award

Jan 21, 2020 | 1:32 PM

Dylan Smart is proud of his Métis heritage and wants to promote his culture to help other young Métis people reach their goals just as he is reaching his.

The Langham inventor is one of the Order of Gabriel Dumont Award recipients in the Bronze Medal category for 2020.

“I am absolutely humbled,” he said. “It was an amazing letter to open. I had no idea I was even nominated… It’s something that is so important to me.”

The Order of Gabriel Dumont Bronze Medal recognizes GDI students and alumni who have distinguished themselves through leadership, community involvement and overall performance.

Smart is an entrepreneur who invented a reinforced padding product for walking, using recycled rubber from old tires for his business SmartPath Safety Systems Ltd. The aim of the product is to create quick, simple and safe pathways for use by people working on construction sites. It’s also useful for making ground-level decking on any surface in minutes.

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“You lay down the [rubber base] every four feet and then you put two-by-fours in the slots; that gives you a safe sustainable pathway system in mere minutes,” Smart said. “It’s a pretty cool product that has endless uses.”

Smart completed classes in business planning and using social media as a marketing tool through the Gabriel Dumont Institute. He also received direction from the school to start up his business and to help it grow.

He plans to use some of the profits from product sales to set up scholarships for GDI students in the future as a way to give back.

“As the company grows, so will the amount of money that is going to be donated,” Smart said. “To me, one of the most important things in life is education. I believe that education is the key to pretty much everything.”

The businessman said he told GDI from the start when he began his new business he wants to be a type of “poster boy” for GDI.

“I want to say: What a great advocate this company is to push Métis business owners to help them grow, and help them get started,” he said. “I want this business to succeed, and I want to tell everyone of the amazing programs that are there for the Métis people, for the Métis culture [at GDI],” he said.

All the Order of Gabriel Dumont Award medals will be handed out at the 40th Anniversary Celebration and Cultural Conference Feb. 6 and 7 in Saskatoon.

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angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @battlefordsNOW