A Winnipeg teacher had his teaching certificate cancelled after he admitted to sending a lengthy series of messages to a student over a period of two years. The Commissioner of Teacher Professional Conduct cancelled Robert Gregoire’s certificate on Oct. 6 following a recent hearing where he admitted to professional misconduct. The report released by the commissioner, posted online, said the situation started when Gregoire was teaching at a middle school in the River East Transcona School Division (RETSD) and started messaging a student and continued after the student moved to high school. The report said the teacher exchanged more than 1,000 messages over Microsoft Teams between March 2022 and February 2024. “Many of these exchanges were initiated by Robert Gregoire and were unrelated to his role as a teacher,” the report reads. The messages saw Gregoire repeatedly invite the student to meet him outside of school, including at restaurants over the noon hour and for dinner. He also exchanged hundreds of text messages with the student using his personal phone, which ended in December 2024. The report added that Gregoire also accepted an opportunity to be transferred to the high school the student attended in 2024. “The thousands of messages exchanged over several years, together with Mr. Gregoire’s failure to disclose the relationship, demonstrate a sustained and deliberate pattern of misconduct rather than isolated lapses in judgement,” the report reads. “This conduct represents a serious abuse of the trust inherent in the teacher-student relationship.” In the hearing, Gregoire admitted his behaviour was professional misconduct, and he voluntarily surrendered his teaching certificate this past May. In a statement, the school division called Gregoire’s conduct unacceptable, saying it “falls well below the standards expected of teachers entrusted with the care and education of students.” They said Gregoire was fired from his job following their own investigation and said the case was referred to both Winnipeg police and Child and Family Services for investigation.
