If you take French classes at NDA, then you know Madame Rentmeester, but do you know her background? 

Madame Rentmeester, French teacher at NDA, has taught at Notre Dame for the past six years.

She’s from Green Bay and went to high school here before going to Minneapolis for college. She later switched to UW-Madison to study French.  Her love of travel and appreciation of other cultures has taken her all over the world, including Croatia, the site of her featured portrait.

Her love for French developed early after taking a French class her freshman year of high school. 

“I fell in love with the language on Day One. I knew I wanted to do something with it,” she explained.

While at first Madame Rentmeester didn’t plan on teaching, her thoughts changed when she started volunteering at her daughter’s school. The experience made her realize she enjoyed working with students, which led her to get a teaching degree at UWGB. 

She’s taught middle school before, but that only led her to realize she liked teaching older kids.

Madame Rentmeester believes that to really know the language, you have to be in an environment to see how others speak it. She has taken trips to France and Quebec and deepened her connection to the language. She says that, at first, it was overwhelming. 

“You can only learn so much in class. When you’re hearing it all around you, it’s very helpful,” she said.

Outside of school, she enjoys watching football, watching movies and taking walks. 

She is fluent in French and Russian, but even while teaching Russian, she would get some French words mixed in on accident.

“Languages come easy to me,” she said.