I recently met a neighbor of ours when I was at Middlebury College in Vermont receiving my doctor of modern languages (DML) degree. While we were waiting to march in to the auditorium for the ceremony, Laurie Patton, the president of Middlebury College, was asking us about our future plans. When I told her about our big school garden project at Edgecomb Eddy School, she looked at me oddly. She actually lives on Barters Island! This is exactly the kind of connection to people and places that has made my nine years in the doctorate program at Middlebury College so special.

Laurie Patton is the kind of person that motivates you to keep learning and to tackle even bigger endeavors. Before she was the president of Middlebury College, she was a professor of Asian religions and Hindu language and she also translates and writes poetry. I began to realize how special my graduation was at the luncheon hosted by President Patton with other DML graduates, trustees, directors of all nine language schools, and immigration lawyer Brian J. O’Dwyer (MA Spanish ’67) who received an honorary doctorate with us.

It was President Patton that encouraged me to share the story of my DML. I started working on my doctorate in 2010. I did coursework in the French and German schools at Middlebury College. I spent a summer abroad in Poitiers, France, and then completed a six-week summer residency in Montreal and Quebec City. I spent the next summer in Vermont taking the written and oral exams in French civilisation, pedagogy, linguistics and literature. After that I chose a topic for my dissertation. I was interested in researching our French speaking heritage in Maine but I decided instead to research the role that magic spells and incantations play in literature, specifically six novels by the Moroccan author Tahar Ben Jelloun.

My advisor Sylvie Requemora-Gros invited me on a study trip to Morocco, where I was able to explore the medina in Fez and even spend a night in Bedouin tents in the Sahara desert. After the Morocco trip I completed my 200-page dissertation, where I examined the linguistic, literary and cultural roles of magic spells. Now I am interested in doing a similar kind of ethnography here in Maine and exploring our French speaking heritage. I also learned some fantastic technology skills that will help me to manage large long-term projects.

The doctorate of modern languages program at Middlebury was an excellent preparation for me as a high school teacher. It was a long and sometimes strange journey, and so I am looking forward to seeing how this experience and my DML degree translates into my teaching at BRHS, as well as my community projects at our Boothbay Harbor Rotary Club. I had thought that graduation was the final step, but President Laurie Patton was so enthusiastic that it motivated me for all kinds of future projects. It also reminded me that the more we reach out the more we feel connected to our local community.