Board of Directors

George Beckingham

George Beckingham is a retired attorney. He founded a sole proprietorship in Tacoma after graduating law school. In addition to a law degree he holds a BA in History from the Univ. of Texas at Arlington. Prior to becoming a lawyer he served in the military. He is a student of the French-Algerian war and an interested observer of French culture today.

Rachelle Cribbs

Christine Denis was born and raised in Québec, Canada.  She moved to the United States in her mid -teens where she continued her education.  She holds a Bachelor of Business Administration specializing in Finance with 10 years of investment management experience.  Christine is a member of the Chartered Financial Analyst Institute and Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst Association.  Bilingual, professional, and energetic, la Québecoise embodies the mission statement of l'Alliance Française and looks forward to collaboratively lead l'Alliance in its function to promote and embrace la francophonie!

Margaret Ganong

Margaret was born and raised in Seattle, Washington, and returned to the Northwest three years ago after spending more than two decades living abroad. During that period, she spent twenty years in France, where her introduction to the French language came through Alliance française on boulevard Raspail in Paris. While in France, she taught English at the French business school HEC (Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales), at Lycée Henri IV (classes préparatoires), and as an independent instructor working with French corporations and executives. She then worked for several years at the corporate headquarters of the global insurance and asset management giant AXA before establishing her own financial and corporate translation business in 1998. In 2006, she transferred her business to Seattle. She is passionate about French culture and would like to contribute to its rayonnement in the Pacific Northwest by finding ways to appeal to the growing francophone community here.

Florent Maillet

Florent Maillet is a travel and hospitality industry entrepreneur. He currently operates the specialty travel company Chocolatine that he founded in 2002. Florent has experience as an Account Executive for the Montepellier (France) office of RSCG, one of France's largest international advertising agencies. A French native who has been an active leader in Seattle's French community for the past 13 years, Florent earned B.A. degrees in Sociology and Business: International Marketing from the University of Tours in Tours, France.

Marie-Pierre Salem

Marie-Pierre is a French-speaking Lebanese. She was awarded her French baccalaureate from Marseilles though she studied in a francophone lazarist high school (Collège Saint Joseph-Antoura) in Lebanon. She then earned her Master’s degree in Business Computing from a French Jesuit University (USJ – Université Saint Joseph). She is a software engineer with 4 + years experience in implementing windows and web based applications for business use. In Lebanon, she helped her mother (who is a French teacher) to start a local non-profit organization to help students who struggle in their homework and prepare them for government exams. She was an active member responsible for implementing the software to facilitate paper work, check accounting procedures as well as tutor students.

Karl Woelfer

Karl Woelfer is a software architect and engineer specializing in real-time safety critical embedded applications ranging from aerospace and defense to medical devices.  He is also a small business owner, a board member of the University District Community Council, and has worked as a volunteer for the Northwest Farmers Market Alliance for the last 13 years.  Karl has been an active member of the Seattle Alliançe Française since 1997 during which time he has worked as a volunteer at the Bastille Day celebrations and most recently for the Ciné Club.  Karl received the Diplome d’études en langue française (DELF-B2) diploma in 2007, and joined the Board of Directors of Alliance Française in 2010.

Linda Youngs

Linda Youngs is a real estate attorney at Hanson Baker in Bellevue. She has a long standing interest in France and French culture. She majored in French at Wellesley College and taught French at the university and high school levels before becoming a lawyer. She has four grandaughters, all of whom are French citizens.