Who is behind Avancée? How long have we been around? Where did we get the idea of opening a language school in a remote French valley?
Today, in 2024, Avancée is a busy little school based in Verchaix, with 4 light and modern classrooms, one of which doubles as a coworking space. 4-5 language teachers work here and online regularly throughout the year.
But how did we get there?
I’m Jenny, I grew up in the Vallée du Haut-Giffre, I have dual nationality from my French mum and British dad. When I turned 19, I thought I’d go and check out my “Englishness” and moved to London, the BIG city! The original plan was to go for a year. Ten years later – oops – I did finally make it back to Samoëns. I’d spent my time in London working lots of different jobs, learning and perfecting my English, travelling the world a bit, and finally I completed a TESOL course.
TESOL
TESOL – more commonly known as TEFL – is an internationally recognised qualification in “Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages” or “Teaching English as a Foreign Language”.
/təˈmɑː.təʊ/ /təˈmeɪ.t̬oʊ/
The Love of the Job
I fell in love with the teaching. I got to work with students from all over the world, an awesome team of teachers, and right in the heart of the city I loved.
Home to the Mountains
Fast forward to 2013 – circumstances brought me home to the mountains. I rediscovered my hometown, took a seasonnaire job at Covey’s Irish Pub, and there, had the conversation that would seal the next chapter: “You’re an English teacher?! But you’re French! Why don’t you teach French?! We need French lessons!”.
And so, JS Language Services was born.
AFS Samoëns
Using the TESOL method, I started teaching a few people privately, helped with translation work, PA stuff, partnered up with AFS Morzine to offer lessons via professional training grants, continued teaching English alongside, and by 2019 I was busy! Too busy in fact to continue all alone. Despite Covid, the first school premises were open in the summer of 2020: Alpine French School Samoëns.
It was a big step, and at that time, opening it in partnership with AFS Morzine made sense.
Welcome Chloé
Chloé and I met around then, she had just finished her qualification in French teaching – but the timing wasn’t quite right: Covid hadn’t given us the easiest start. In 2021 however, we got back in touch and started working together in Samoëns! Chloé teaches at Avancée as well as in the Vallée de l’Arve where she works with insertion programmes. She also does volunteer work with migrants. Full of empathy, she’s flexible in her teaching and centres her lessons on her students’ interests. Aside from teaching, she also manages the school’s social events where students of French & English meet for language exchanges, and she also creates teaching material. When she’s not working, she tends to a huge vegetable garden, wakes up at dawn for yoga practice, and hikes up mountains to bivouac and paraglide back down – that’s when she’s not enjoying a bit of city lights and culture – originally from Nantes, she’s a little torn between her love of the mountains, the ocean and city life.
Bonnie Joins the Team
Bonnie popped into the school in the summer of 2021 to book French lessons for her two little ones, having just moved back in the valley with her family – Bonnie had spent some time here in her 20s. She mentioned in passing that she was a qualified English teacher… Not long after that she also joined! Bonnie’s students are always relaxed, it must be her Australian ways. During lessons, they laugh, they chat, she’s got a way of putting her students at ease so that they feel like they’re just meeting a friend! When she’s not at school, she’s probably trail running or running around like the busy mum that she is! Bonnie is our General English teacher, and she also teaches business English and ESP – English for Specific Purpose – which means that whatever her students’ professional or personal projects, she’ll build a programme to fit their objectives.
Elise Makes it Four
Elise used to work at our sister school and she came to Samoëns to lend a hand every so often. Somehow, every so often became quite often, until she just became an established Avancée French teacher, alongside Chloé. Elise is super organised, and her lessons as well. She loves finding new games, but also turning old-fashioned methods into new fun activities that students love. She also works on creating teaching material for the school, and being the creative person she is, the finished product always works well and looks great too! When not at school, she works on her home renovation project, makes crafts and runs workshops. And once a year she usually disappears for a few weeks to a far away country to satisfy her travel bug!
We Welcome Mary
At Avancée, we also run an association to teach English to local French children and Mary is the latest teacher to join. The “rentrée” (back to school) 2024 has just happened, and the kid’s club brings lots of energy to the school! Mary has quite the background, having worked in many different roles for NGOs in London & Geneva on international projects. She also manages a mountain bike guiding company, Ride the Alps, with her partner, she’s an experienced piano teacher (in English and in French) and is in the process of completing a master’s in education. Mary loves teaching small groups and creating her own structured plans. Children learn in a supportive & friendly atmosphere, her lessons always include games, colours, lovely books and reading – she works a lot on pronunciation which is great when working with younger students as their ears are so open and their speech still so flexible…
Management Role
For my part, teaching has taken a backstep because of the management & admin role I’ve had to take on, but I still enjoy the classroom. I also try and use my experience to help and support Avancée teachers, find & create interesting teaching resources, and above all, ensure our students and teachers find in Avancée a place where learning and working is enjoyable. Growing up, I didn’t like school very much and it took me a long time to discover that I did actually love learning! So many people come through our doors with bad memories of their language lessons at school, and it’s very rewarding to hear them say how much they’ve enjoyed their language lessons with us! Some people learn easily, some find it more challenging, but I believe everyone should enjoy the process!
Avancée is Born
In 2023 we moved to our new premises in Verchaix – we had outgrown the Samoëns school. At the same time, our partner school was going through big administrative changes, and there came a need for us to rebrand and become more independent.
Une “avancée” means a “move forward” which we thought was fitting.
