“Just believing in ourselves is such a gift,” Suzanne Truett, a San Rafael High School French teacher eagerly says. She stands attentively outside her door, formally greeting students with a “bonjour” as they walk past or go into her classroom. She creates a class where her students can see the world more deeply through the power of language.
SRHS senior Michelle Manzo says, ¨She makes French fun, she’s very hands-on and has us do activities that are really fun and engaging.¨
Growing up, Truett was constantly encouraged to explore and pursue her possibilities. “My parents were really supportive of whatever I chose to do,” she said. “They never dictated what they thought I should do. They might have expressed concerns about them, but they were like give it a try.” Her open-minded attitude gave her the sense to chase experiences that would later define her career and life.
By her senior year, Truett was able to speak French, Spanish, and German, but her curiosity didn’t stop in the classroom. Between her sophomore and junior years, she was an exchange student living with a family in France for a month. She did it a second time between her junior and senior years but this time, as an exchange student living in Ireland. “I would say that completely changed my trajectory,” she said as her eyes brightened. Those early experiences laid the foundations for her passion in language and traveling.
After high school, she attended the University of Washington. She was drawn there particularly after spending her summer in Ireland, thinking Seattle would have the same weather. “I kind of misjudged,” she said, laughingly. “I was in Ireland in the summer, but I was in college in the winter and it was way too cold and rainy for me.”
Truett stayed in Seattle for almost two years and then transferred back home to the University of Arizona, where she completed her degree. Before she became a teacher, she was an opera singer. “I started out as a voice major for opera,” she explained. “But for opera, I had to take Italian, so I started taking Italian.”
Truett had transferred universities and switched her focus. She earned degrees in both Italian and French. She went on to receive her masters in music from San Francisco Conservatory of Music. She then performed opera for 10 years. “I was going to be an opera singer,” she said. “That was what my career was actually going to be.”
Truett’s husband is also a professional opera singer and constantly performs for a living. But as Truett became a mother, her priorities shifted. “I needed something more stable, that’s when I decided to go back and get my teaching credential,” she said.
Truett’s love and fervor for language never wavered. “I knew that if I was a teacher, I would teach languages,” she said. Today, she is credentialed in Italian, Spanish, and French. However, at San Rafael High School, her focus is on only teaching French. Her teaching philosophy is embedded in connection, curiosity, and empathy. “Languages are a way to break down the walls that separate us, communication is that start of understanding,” she said.
Truett’s teaching philosophy fuels her love for traveling. Being a teacher, she has kept a promise to herself to show her students the world and beyond. “The first time I went abroad changed my life. So as soon as I became a teacher, I promised that when my kids were old enough, I’d start taking students on trips,” she said.
Since then, Truett has led multiple school trips abroad, allowing her students to have the opportunity to see new cultures through their own lenses. She is leading two trips abroad in 2026, two in 2027, and one in 2028. All five trips are open for enrollment, and Truett would love to have as many SR students travel with her as possible. She describes the process of student trips as well as its necessity. “Organizing trips is a lot of work, but I feel like the cause is a worthy cause and really important,” she said.
Inside the classroom she tries to create that same sense of discovery and growth. Other than teaching her students academically to learn the language of French, she emphasizes the well-being of students. She regularly checks in on their feelings and what they do to take care of themselves. “It’s important to stop and ask what they’re doing for self-care,” she said.
In the end, Truett says that learning a language isn’t just about mastering verbs or pronunciation but instead it’s about learning how to connect. “Getting out of our own way, trusting ourselves, and reaching out to others, that’s what language is really about,” she said.
In her classroom, the lessons taught go far beyond just learning French. Truett’s teachings in understanding, courage, and communication are the kind of lessons that can carry someone anywhere in the world.
