Profile & BIO
I grew up in Quebec City, surrounded by monuments, statues, plaques, historical buildings and the innovative Musée de la Civilization. These elements fed my insatiable curiosity and fascination for historical matter and matters.
A 2-year stint working on a outfitting ranch leading horseback treks in the Rockies of Jasper Alberta in the mid 1990s was my very practical initiation to natural and wildlife interpretation. This experience led me to be drawn instinctively to heritage interpretive planning. and then on to complete a certificate in this field at Selkirk College in Nelson, British-Columbia.
In 2000 I began studying history at Carleton University in Ottawa and working as a guide at the Canadian War Museum. My first brush with military history at this time offered lots of occasions to meet with First and Second World War veterans, which compelled me to learn more by completing a battlefield study tour in 2001 with the Canadian Battlefields Foundation. These experiences would seal my passion for and commitment to museums and military history.
After guiding and leading teams abroad for a couple of years at Canadian sites of memory (Beaumont-Hamel, Vimy and Normandy), I took a professional pause to raise my two Franco-Canadian sons and become a certified yoga instructor, quietly nestled in the Pyreneans mountains of southern France.
With my young children finally in school, I returned to my passion for Canadian military history in 2010, this time in Toronto, and it was in 2011 that I was offered to become “second in command” of the Juno Beach Centre, the Canadian museum on the beaches of Normandy, leading its history department for 7 years. During this period, I completed my master’s degree in education at the University of Caen.
After over 12 years in exile, the call for family, friends, winters, snowshoes and my skis became too strong to resist; Canada was on my mind and in my heart and it was time to return home.
Education:
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Heritage and Interpretive planning certificate, Selkirk College, Nelson, British Columbia. 1999.
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History degree, Carleton University, Ottawa. 2005.
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Master 2, Médiation culturelle et enseignement, École Supérieure du Professorat et de l’Education, Académie de Caen. Métiers de l’enseignement, de l’éducation et de la formation. (Memoir title: "La transmission mémorielle des plages du Débarquement pour le jeune public: Pédagogie et muséographie.") 2018.
Experience:
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2011 and 2017/ head of the history department of the Juno Beach Centre, Normandy, France, creating exhibitions, education programs and digital apps development managing acquisitions and collections, historical training of guiding teams and leading the Juno Beach Centre Association’s Summer Institute and professional development battlefield study tour.
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2010/ Research and Collections officer, “Stories of the Second World War: The Memory Project, initiated by Historica Canada.
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1999 and 2005/ 6 years at the Canadian War Museum with clients and education services.