Summer 2024 semester dates for group classes: Our group classes are unfortunately full. Please excuse the inconvenience.
We are continuing to offer private classes on Zoom
The Team
After working at the Alliance Française of Portland, we decided to create a community in line with our vision of human relationships, the discovery of French culture, and the practice of learning French.
Stéphane Tullio
Director / Teacher
Classes: Advanced, intermediate, private and semi-private, older children
Stéphane has a deep respect and a great admiration for all of the students with whom he has the privilege to work. To learn and to express yourself in a foreign language is one of the most beautiful but also most difficult things there is. He is very sensitive to this effort, and for this reason, he always gives 100% of himself. Using current teaching methods and experiential learning, he infuses each class with extraordinary energy and enthusiasm, and his students appreciate his devotion and care to teaching. While remaining serious and focused on the task of language learning, he injects a remarkable level of camaraderie and fun in each and every class session.
Parisian by birth, Stéphane grew up in a distinctive intellectual and cultural environment created by his father, a photojournalist for Paris Match, and his mother, an actress who has worked with Claude Lelouch and Jacques Brel, among many others. More so than his studies in literature and philosophy at the Sorbonne, it was in the sidewalk cafés of the 8th arrondissement, in the bars of the Marais, and during long dinners (culinary arts and gastronomy are very important to him) with family and friends that he learned and internalized the Parisian values of intellectual rigor and cosmopolitanism.
After honing his skills in communication while working in advertising for Publicis, Stéphane devoted himself fully to the humanities: philosophy; history; religious studies; pop-culture; and writing. Author of a novel, Vegas, he also wrote a feature film, LA Generation, and directed two short films with his brother, Jesus is Back (and he is not happy), as well as K Citizen, which was shown at the Cannes film festival in 2010.
He has taught French in Portland since May 2016.
Stéphane talks about the fire at Notre-Dame Cathedral
KGW News, April 16th, 2019
Adèle Rousseau
Teacher
Classes: Children
Adèle hails from the beautiful city of Besançon, France, and grew up in the Alsace region, on the border of Switzerland. She went on to earn her Master's degree in Humanities including French Literature at the University of Nice.
After graduating in 2015, she moved to Portland where she began teaching French to children and adults. Her experience working in a French Immersion Preschool led her to reflect upon children’s innate ability and eagerness to learn a new language. She later went on to teach French language lessons to children, teenagers and adults at the Alliance Francaise de Portland.
She loves seeing the satisfaction on her students faces when they overcome challenges and begin expressing themselves in a new language. Her goal is to motivate her students, to give them the tools, as well as the practice they need to reach the skills and confidence to have a fluid conversation with a French person. As a teacher she strives to adapt to each student’s particularities to find the best way to accompany each one of them on their French learning journey.
Pearl
Mascot
Pearl was born in Los Angeles to a French family and easily navigates between life in France and in the US. While in France, Pearl enjoys the relaxation of paddle boarding in Corsica, sniffing the oak lined pathways of the Fôret of Tronçais, and wandering the streets of Paris.
Interacting with students, and the treats they will most certainly offer, is Pearl’s true passion. The most sought after member of the team, this sweet and spirited Yorkipoo is always available for French conversation while exploring the sights and smells of Portland. Pearl’s “joie de vivre” is contagious.
