L’ESSOR
newsletter of the professional french masters program University of Wisconsin-Madison Volume 14, Issue 2
From the PFMP to Africa
SPRING 2018
Recent program alum promoted, managing development projects in Burkina Faso and Cameroon in this issue Program alumnus working on Global Health Supply Chain project in Cameroon and Burkina Faso
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Alumni profile : Emily Swartz on French 2 food, the Midwest, Networking and the PFMP From the Director
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Current students & alumni
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I cannot quite say how much this program helped me to be doing what I have dreamed of doing.
Since graduating from the PFMP in 2016, Jonathan Gatke has spent a lot of his professional time on development in Africa: first, at the non-governmental organization Population Services International, then at the private international development company Chemonics International, where he currently works. Most recently, Jonathan has been working on the USAID-funded “GHSCPSM” project, which stands for “Global Health Supply Chain— Procurement and Supply Management.” According to Chemonics, who is implementing the program, its mission is to make sure people around the world “have access to critical health commodities.” For Jonathan, this is a logical extension of public health-related projects he worked on at PSI—and, before that, at Congolese human rights NGO Azur Développement, while still a student in the PFMP. As Jonathan describes it, his main job on this project “is to ensure that my field offices of a combined 50 staff in two countries are working in compliance with our USAID contract and staying on track to their yearly work plan. This includes tracking the procurements of pharmaceuticals in both countries with more than a combined budget of $30 million. This has
Jonathan Gatke (MFS 2016, international development) in Basoule, Burkina Faso
allowed me to stretch myself and grow my capacity in ways I didn't know I could.” “I use French on a daily basis,” he says, crediting his fluency for leading him to his current position of Project Management Unit Manager for Burkina Faso and Cameroon. His training in the PFMP remains central to his career development. “I cannot quite say how much this program helped me to be doing what I have dreamed of doing,” he adds.
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ALUMNI PROFILE
Emily Swartz (MFS 2017, business)
What do you do now for a living? I am a Food Trade Advisor with Business France, the French Trade Commission, in Chicago. Essentially, my job is to help French food businesses come to the US. We do this by conducting market research studies on the US market, specifically addressing the client’s business sector; making contacts with American food industry professionals to set up B2B meetings; attending trade shows; sending American companies on sourcing trips to France; and setting up events for French companies to make business and customer contacts in the States.
How did the PFMP help you get there? I would not have known about the job without the PFMP, because the person who held this position before me is a fellow PFMP alum! He sent me the job posting and encouraged me to apply. I use my French every day at my job, and the business vocabulary I learned while studying in Madison has helped me immensely. Studying the French management style helped me to understand what to expect from the organization when I started. Finally, my internship in Québec gave me market research and project management experience, and more generally made me comfortable with working in French.
Emily Swartz (MFS 2017, business), at Schwartz’s Deli in Montreal. Emily did her PFMP internship at the Fondation Québec Philanthrope and now works for Business France. She lives in Chicago.
Studying the French management style helped me to understand what to expect from the organization when I started.
What are the biggest challenges in your line of work these days? I have only been with Business France for a few months, so I am not yet an expert in this line of work, but one thing that I have encountered is a lack of interest in the Midwest. Many French companies are interested in the East and West Coasts, but they do not know much about the Midwest, so they don’t immediately consider it when planning where to export. When speaking with French clients, I emphasize how important this market is in the food industry, as well as the regional differences from places like New York and California.
What do you hope your work will accomplish? I hope to make French food more accessible to more Americans. One of my coworkers and fellow PFMP alum, John Brunner, has worked to make contacts with American companies like Dollar General, and I hope to make more contacts with similar retailers. Just because it’s French doesn’t mean it has to be snooty! (continued on page 3
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From the Director : Use Your French It’s official: in our eighteenth year, the PFMP is now too large and too active for us to be able to include all contributions to our semester newsletter. The popularity of our “Alumni Profile” and other alumni-themed articles, combined with the regular updates in “Current Students and Alumni,” have created a real uptick in information flow from our alumni to the program, for publication in L’ESSOR. That’s what we’d call a good problem. Good because more stories in these pages help us illustrate even more clearly the personalized experience of the Professional French Masters Program. The program “experience” involves our alumni beyond the occasional event or fundraiser. Our students do actual research with the help of PFMP alumni. (See Emily Swartz’s Alumni Profile on page 2.) A research project on importing
PFMP student Abby Rue (business) and colleagues at Paris-based Franco-Korean Internet start-up Mylopy.
French wine to the United States requires not only reading books and scholarly articles. In the PFMP, it also means contacting alumni who work in the field, to interview them about law, marketing, and even the aesthetics of wine label design. Eventually, that’s how you get to the job. It flows in the other direction, too. In their internships in French-speaking countries, PFMP students often find themselves in a uniquely favorable position of helping their colleagues do market research on U.S. clienteles. In her recent internship at Mylopy, a Paris start-up whose mission is to connect visitors with locals in Paris and other large cities, Abby Rue (business) spent part of her time carefully researching American tourism trends abroad, so that Mylopy might market to that clientele more effectively. If you are just discovering the PFMP, I would encourage you to think of this newsletter as a narrative, a constantlyunfolding story… with lots of characters. The sheer excitement our students and alumni show in contributing to L’ESSOR indicates their investment, not only in their own graduate education in the use of professional French, but in the community of others devoted to that same goal. As unique as our students and alumni are, they do tend to share that passion for using their French. But they also understand that the art of networking is often harder and more intensive then they had expected. And that, in the PFMP, it is one of the primary tools of our craft.
Networking can get you the job, but in the Professional French Masters Program it is also one of the primary tools of our craft.
Swartz (continued from p. 2) Any suggestions for prospective students considering the PFMP? I think there are two really important skills that the PFMP helps develop in students: adaptability and networking. Many PFMP students have experience living and working in France before starting the program, but the PFMP really delves into the reasons behind why the French (and people from other cultures, for that matter)
are different from Americans. The French communicate very differently from Americans at work, for example. The PFMP also helped me get really comfortable with networking, and when I came home from my internship I immediately started reaching out to alums. All the alums I reached out to were very encouraging and helpful, and some even said that because they had been helped in the past by other alumni, they wanted to “pay it forward” by helping me. Because of the alumni network, I was able to secure a job within one month of starting my job hunt.
I was able to secure a job within one month of starting my job hunt.
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Current Students & Alumni
Lauren Herzog (L), at work in Thiès, Senegal
Diplômé en français et études internationales d'Indiana University (BA 2015), Duncan Brown (business) commencera son stage PFMP en juin, au sein de la Fondation Québec Philanthrope, où il travaillera dans les domaines de la recherche et du conseil.
Sarah Craver (MFS 2012, media/arts/cultural production) is the Program Coordinator for MIT-France and Belgium. In collaboration with Laura Gross (MFS 2012), she is developing an international arts residency program.
A program associate at FHI 360 in Washington, DC, Serena Berkowitz (MFS 2017, international education) works on the U.S. Department of State's Sports Visitor and Sports Envoy program. She will be coordinating incoming groups of international coaches and youth athletes, and her first assignment is accompanying a group of Zambian wheelchair basketball coaches to the National Wheelchair Basketball Tournament in Louisville this April.
Nicole D'Amour (MFS 2004, international development) is now a Segment Marketing Manager at CNH Industrial Parts & Service. She is responsible for creating the marketing strategy for harvesting equipment parts and branded products in North America.
Katrina Brown (MFS 2013, international education) is Manager for Programs and Operations in Learning Abroad at the University of Utah.
Jessica Dean (Certificate 2014, business) is a software developer and technical writer at Flow Auto in Greensboro, North Carolina. When she was hired, Jessica was told that her “work in France and obvious ambition” were central in getting her the job.
Actuellement à CEA Study Abroad Paris, Yoann Buidin (MFS 2017, éducation internationale) vient d'accepter un poste à ECLA Campus, nouvelle résidence étudiante à Palaiseau. Il sera chargé de la gestion / commercialisation de la résidence, qui accueillera étudiants, doctorants et chercheurs internationaux.
After eight years as a writer and research analyst in Pennsylvania state government (six years at the PA House of Representatives and two years with the PA Early Learning Investment Commission), and then two years spent doing freelance political and strategic communications consulting, Gretchen Dlugolecki (MFS 2008, EU affairs) is now Director at Fairmount Media, a digital media firm based in Philadelphia.
Originaire de Cincinnati, Abigail Carr (business) commencera son stage en juin en France, au sein de SaintéLoc Racing, une écurie de sport automobile. Elle travaillera en marketing communication et gestion des sponsors.
Above: Katrina Brown Below (L-R): Taylor Steinbruegge, Abby Carr, Bucky Badger and Nancy Stockdale at this year’s “Degree Dash.”
Sarah Craver
Avant d'arriver au PFMP, Daniel Christensen (business) a fait une mission religieuse en France pendant deux ans et un stage à Nice dans le domaine du commerce international. Diplômé en français de l'Université de l'Utah (HBA 2017), il s'intéresse particulièrement au monde sportif. Lindsay Colbert (MFS 2007, international development, ) was named Executive Director of the Foundation for Peripheral Neuropathy. In this new role, she has the overall strategic and operational responsibilities for the Foundation's staff, programs, expansion, and execution of its mission. Lindsay lives with her husband and daughter in Glenview, Illinois.
Alex Esposito (MFS etc.): Alexander Esposito est Industry Analyst chez Euromonitor. En plus de ses Recent alumnae Andrea recherches sur les marchés américains et canadiens pour Ferrer and Cassandra Tant, before returning to les boissons, il présente ses work in France résultats aux clients sous forme de rapports, blogues et lors de conférences. Avant de rejoindre Euromonitor, Alex a travaillé comme chargé de développement chez Business France où il accompagnait les entreprises françaises lors de leur entrée sur le marché américain. Il vit à Chicago. A la suite de son stage avec IES Abroad Paris French Studies, Andrea Ferrer (MFS 2017, éducation internationale) a été embauchée comme responsable du programme de stages et assistante de programme. Elle (continued on page 5)
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(continued from page 4) Jenna Holt (MFS 2017, international education) is Assistant Director of Global Recruiting at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, California. Diplômée de UW-Madison (BA 2016, journalisme), Ye Jin (business) oriente ses recherches sur le marketing et la publicité et aimerait travailler pour une agence dans ce domaine après son stage PFMP.
Duncan Brown, during a visit to the U.S. headquarters of French agricultural and industrial equipment manufacturer, Manitou. accompagne chaque étudiant dans les différentes étapes : de la recherche du stage à son bon déroulement. Diplômée en langues romanes et communication de l'University of Georgia (Athens, BA 2017), Cequoyah Gates (business) s'intéresse particulièrement à la gastronomie et à l'événementiel. Elle travaille actuellement à la Wisconsin School of Business, comme coordonnatrice assistante au programme Evening and Executive MBA. Julia Grawemeyer (MFS 2008, media/arts/ cultural production) works as a French to English translator, college instructor and cultural consultant. This April, her translation of Almir Narayamoga Surui and Corine Sombrun's book Sauver la planète comes out at Schaffner Press. Bradley Grochocinski (MFS 2017, business) is Conference Coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Annual Conference on South Asia and continues to tutor in his private tutoring company, Teach Me Français. Laura Gross (MFS 2012, media/arts/ cultural production) lives in Washington DC, where she works at Cultural Vistas and sings in the Washington Chorus.
Après avoir reçu son diplôme en études internationales et français de Hope College, Laura Johnson (éducation internationale) continue ses études à UW-Madison et s'intéresse à la qualité de vie des étudiants étrangers, ainsi qu'à la mobilité étudiante vers la France. Cet été elle fera son stage au sein d'INSA, à Toulouse. Melanie Kathan (MFS 2014, media/arts/cultural production) has left her job at the Université d'Avignon and is now working full-time as freelance language teacher, translator, and editor in Avignon, France. She continues to pursue her love of music in her spare time, playing with both a wind band and an early music ensemble in the area. Diplômée en français et études internationales d'UWMadison (BA 2016), Danielle Leuker (business) voudrait travailler dans le domaine de la communication ou du marketing. Son dernier grand projet de recherche au PFMP a traité de l'utilisation des réseaux sociaux comme stratégie marketing. Joshua Marris (MFS 2015, business) has recently joined the business software company SAP Ariba as a bilingual procurement operations specialist. Stephanie Martell (MFS 2011, international education) has left her position as International Student Advisor at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and is now International Student Advisor for WelTec and Whitireia, partnered polytechnical institutes in Wellington, New Zealand. Kathleen Campbell Monich (MFS 2015, international education) left her position as Program Coordinator for International Partnerships & Agreements at Georgia State University and is now Department Coordinator for International Programs at the Fashion Institute of Technology. She and her husband live in New York.
Jenna Holt
PFMP students and tutors at the Fall 2017 Orientation reception
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Now in her fourth year at Champagne LaurentPerrier, Kathleen Patterson (MFS 2010, business) has been promoted to National Accounts Manager. Based in New York City, she will be responsible for working with distributors across the country to establish and grow existing business in larger chain retail stores, restaurant organizations, and hotel groups. Program alumni Christopher Quinlan (MFS 2003, international development) and Jennifer Quinlan (MFS 2005, international education) both work for Brigham Young University. Chris is an International Studies Program Director, and Jennifer is an Academic Consultant & PhD candidate in Second Language Acquisition. They are both featured guest lecturers, where they often highlight experiences and professional knowledge gained through the PFMP: Chris in French Business, grant writing, and international development courses, and Jen in Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition Teaching M.A. courses.
L-R: PFMP alumnae, Shannon Becker (MFS 2008, media/arts/cultural production), now Assistant Professor of French at Northern Illinois University; and Mandi Schoville (MFS 2005, international education), Assistant Director, PFMP, at the Fall 2017 meeting of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages.
Amy Musser (MFS 2012, business) has left her position as Communications Manager at Redfin and is now the Director of Public Relations & Promotions at Sugar Mountain, a Seattle-based national creative food company that manages several culinary brands, restaurants and a nonprofit that educates children and adults on how to make healthy food choices through interactive cooking classes. This year she will travel to France for a cheese festival and to an island off the coast of Madagascar to participate in a reforestation project. Janet Noel (business, 2016) est actuellement professeur de français à Las Cruces High School (Nouveau Mexique). Emily Ostenson (MFS 2013, international education) works at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, where she is Study Abroad Advisor for France and Italy Programs.
Diplômée en français et anglais de l’UW-Madison (BA 2016), Shannon Reader (business) a travaillé l’an dernier comme assistant d’anglais près de Bordeaux. Elle s’intéresse particulièrement à l’importation-exportation et au marketing des produits alimentaires français. Elle fera son stage cet automne à la Paris Wine Company.
Kathleen Patterson
Kathleen Patterson is National Accounts Manager at Champagne Laurent-Perrier in New York City.
Alexander Schirk (business) est diplômé en français et histoire de Gettysburg College (BA 2015). Originaire de la Pennsylvanie, il s'intéresse aux domaines du marketing et de la traduction. Sarah Sommerkamp (MFS 2015, international development) left her position as Field Coordinator with Mavuno and has joined Jewish Vocational Services - Kansas City as the Global Gardens Manager. She is enthusiastic about the intersection of her skills and interests to assist recently resettled refugees with community integration and food security. Après son BA en français et communication à Valparaiso University, Taylor Steinbruegge (média/arts/
Jennifer and Chris Quinlan
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Cassandra Tant (back row), with CEI colleagues in Saint-Malo.
Cassandra Tant is the Inbound Program Assistant for high school programs at Centre d’échanges internationaux (CEI) in Saint-Malo, France.
Cet automne, Alica Valle-Guerrero fera son stage à l’école de commerce HEC Montréal.
production culturelle) a travaillé quelques années dans le marketing, comme chargée de compte chez Ansira, pour la marque Lincoln Canada. Elle s'intéresse au cinéma, particulièrement à la promotion des films français à l'étranger, et vise une carrière dans l'industrie des médias. Diplômée en français et études internationales du College of Charleston (BA 2016), Nancy Stockdale (business) a fait son dernier projet de recherche au PFMP sur la gestion interculturelle. Cet automne, elle fera son stage PFMP au sein de Join a School in France, une entreprise de la Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie Paris Île-de-France. Kerry Strader (MFS 2017, éducation internationale) est conseillère study abroad à Miami University (OH). Cet automne, au Luxembourg, elle participera au 50e anniversaire du programme d’échange de Miami University dans ce pays-là. « Je me sens chanceuse mais aussi reconnaissante au PFMP, ditelle, de m’avoir donné les outils pour réussir mon parcours.» Emily Swartz (MFS 2017, business) is a Food Trade Advisor with Business France, at the Consulate of France in Chicago. Diplômée en français de Northern Kentucky University (BA 2016), Brooke Talley (education internationale) fait actuellement un stage au bureau des étudiants internationaux (UW-Madison), où elle s'occupe principalement de communications et des réseaux sociaux. Avant de commencer le PFMP, elle a travaillé pendant un an comme assistant d’anglais au Lycée Nicéphore Niépce, en Bourgogne. Cassandra Tant (MFS 2017, international education) is the Inbound Program Assistant for high school programs at Centre d'échanges internationaux (CEI) in Saint Malo, France. Karen Tubb (MFS 2011, éducation) est professeur adjoint de français à Centre College à Danville, Kentucky. Elle a récemment enseigné un cours sur le cinéma du Québec. Diplômée en français de California State UniversityFresno, Alicia Valle-Guerrero (éducation
L-R : Brianda Castellanos, Ruby Blau, Kim Kroeger internationale) s'intéresse particulièrement à travailler avec les étudiants internationaux dans les universités américaines. Son dernier grand projet de recherche au PFMP a traité des étudiants étrangers dans les universités québécoises. Cet automne elle fera son stage à l'école de commerce HEC Montréal. Kaitlyn Waller (MFS 2016, international education) has left her position as college counselor at Zhejiang Fuyang High School in Hangzhou, China, to work at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. In her role as CUSP Student Success Navigator, she will be helping Rwandan students pursue degrees in the College of Agriculture Sciences and Natural Resources. Cristina Zepeda (business) a étudié la zoologie et le français à l’UW-Madison (BS 2016). Elle s’intéresse à la conservation environnementale et plus particulièrement à la communication et à la sensibilisation communautaire au sein des ONG environnementales. Cet été elle fera un stage à Stories for Humanity (Montréal), suivi d'un stage cet automne au sein de Nature Québec, à la ville de Québec.
L’ESSOR Newsletter of the Professional French Masters Program
Professional French Masters Program University of Wisconsin-Madison 618 Van Hise Hall 1220 Linden Drive Madison, WI 53706