by:  Anoushka Batra

    She enjoys travelling, exotic animals, and jungle safaris…Ladies and Gentleman…WHS French teacher Madame Mary Flanagan.

    Madame Flanagan was born on May 22, 1962 in Lynn, Massachusetts. As a child, she had a permanent home on the North Shore of Massachusetts. She grew up surrounded by many furry creatures, such as dogs and cats.

    She attended college at two different schools, at first she attended Boston University to earn her undergraduate and then she transferred to Georgetown University. Madame Flanagan continued to have a strong passion for dancing all through her school life. Later in her career, before she joined the WHS staff, she worked as a research linguist on the development of  modern translation software.

    Madame Flanagan has now been teaching here at WHS for the  past 12 years. She enjoys coming to school every day and sharing her interests in foreign language with her students. When asked what was her favorite part of her job, Madame Flanagan comments, “I think the connections that you make with the kids.”

   Madame Flanagan also says that her job is really about getting “students to look outside themselves, and picture themselves in a context that goes beyond the immediate town and country, and I try to make them see themselves as participants in a very big world and to be aware that the culture that they experience is not the only culture around them.”  She would like to teach a more proficiency-based curriculum to her students opposed to the one she is required to teach now.

    When asked where she would go, if she could go anywhere in the world, she said she would go to a national park somewhere in Africa because she loves travelling and the wildlife that Africa has to offer.  Madame Flanagan is a great addition to the WHS staff and she aims to make her students as successful as possible. She says that it’s satisfying to watch the freshmen kids come into her class knowing nothing and leaving senior year fluent in French.