This week marked the beginning of my seven-month post as an English teaching assistant. It began on Monday with a cafeteria lunch to meet the English teachers at Lycee Clemenceau, and ended with a quail dinner at the home of the woman who head's the English department at Lycee Guist'Hau, but a lot happened in between.
Monday was an exciting day. I met the staff members I will be working with at Clemenceau, including the other teaching assistant, Kate, who is from The Isle of Man (where, evidently we should all be investing in trusts to avoid things like inheritance taxes and value-added tax). The rest of the staff was very friendly and welcoming.
The school itself is palatial, and has quite a reputation and quite a history. It celebrated its 200th anniversary in 2008 and, at one time, was the only high school in the region. It has a long list of alums who are well-known in France but a couple of the most prominent are Jules Verne and General Clemenceau, a hero of the first World War after whom the school was renamed (having been the Lycee de Nantes until that time). The school has about 1500 students. Half of them are 15-18 year-olds preparing to take the Bac, the national high school graduation exam. The other half are Prepat students. They are 18-20 and have already passed the Bac but are continuing their studies in hopes of gaining entrance into the "Grands Ecoles," the French equivalent of the Ivy League. All schools in France are free, including universities, but many, including this high school, require students to pass rigorous entrance exams to attend. I often get funny looks and raised eyebrows when I tell French people I am teaching at Clemenceau. It is the most competitive high school in Nantes, and Nantes was ranked second in France in 2008. In addition to English they offer German, Spanish, Italian, Portugeuse, Russian, Arabic and Chinese and most students take multiple foreign languages.
I finaly visited Lycee Guist'Hau for the first time on Thursday. It is also highly competitive and well-renowned in Nantes, but doesn't have the same nationwide reputation that Clemenceau seems to have. The English staff there was incredibly welcoming. The other teaching assistant is named Shoshana. She hails from Jamaica, so I'm working with two island girls this year. She and I had dinner with one prof. and her family last night at their home on the other side of the Loire. The meal was incredible and very typically French, Champagne and ordeuvres, quail, wine, cheese a,d tarte au poire. I have had drinks with two other profs., one of whom is Canadian and is engaged to a Frenchman who owns a bar near where I am living now. I hope to find long-term housing in the area and if I do I am sure I will be a regular at this place. It's full of students and young professionals, but it is an extremely welcoming, relaxed environment (typical of Nantes). There was an independant/amateur film being taped there the nigh I went so I got to watch some French people pretend to be drunk and fight and then make up over a glass over beer. Having a connection with the owner also gained me access to the upstairs bar, where I listened in on a meeting dealing with plans for a concert series at various local bars, and drank some free punch.
I had my first interations with students at the end of the week at Guist'Hau. I will be dealing mostly with 15-16 year-olds at Guist'Hau (though I will have all ages at Clemenceau). The kids were generally talkative and fairly profficient in English. They had prepared some questions for me to get to know me better. Most of it had to do with where I was from and my family and things, but they are very curious about American culture and politics. It was interesting to hear their perceptions of, and stereotypes about the U.S. They imagine a country full of enormous cities, with enormous cars and enourmous people crowding the streets, often suing each other. I told them about American stereotypes about the French, and we had some pretty interesting discussions.
Tonight I'm off to a wine and cheese party at the apartment I am hoping to move into soon. The owner, my future roommate, is a 26 year-old French fromager. More news to follow soon.
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