Danelle Mosher and Marci Harris go way back. 

Over the years, their lives have intertwined through work, kids, spouses and so much more. The two began as neighbors, however it wasn’t until they both joined a French discussion group, that they got to know each other better. Because Marci and Danelle were both French teachers, they found it useful to have a space to connect with native speakers and ask questions about the language. 

Once Marci began teaching at CHS, Danelle and Marci realized they complimented each other perfectly. 

“I think we’re the best team,” Danelle said. “We are Yin Yang, you know. We are just the two opposites, but we have a ton of overlap. We balance each other really well.” 

This year, Danelle and Marci had a chance to put their teamwork in action, as they embarked on a school trip to France with 20 of their students. Because there were so many details they had to hammer out, Danelle and Marci used their opposite personalities to their advantage. Oftentimes Marci would come up with many activities for the group, and Danelle would help organize and narrow down the list. 

“I think sometimes she gets all these great ideas and I can say ‘that would be fun but maybe let’s pick two’,” Danelle said. “But she’s also really good with throwing three or four ideas out there and knowing that they’re not all going to stick. So we would talk through things and be able to find the best option and what made sense.”

A few days later, it was time to send the students off on their home-stays with French families in Montpelier. This was the perfect chance for Danelle, Marci and their husbands to spend some quality time together. And After a long and somewhat confusing trek to their hotel, Danelle and Marci set out to look for a place to eat as it was getting late.

“Whichever way we picked was the wrong way,” Danelle said. “There was nothing. And we ended up in this little tobacco shop. We got different potato chips and bottles of Orangina or something like that. We asked people where there was food and everyone was like ‘no everything is closed’. And we [thought], all right I guess this is dinner.” 

The next day, Marci and Danelle discovered that about two or three blocks in the opposite direction was a very upbeat and happening area. They found plenty of ways to fill the days including renting a car to visit nearby cities and meeting up for dinner each night. 

Marci and Danelle’s lives overlapped in many different places before they ever began teaching together—one of those ways being their husbands, Bill and Nick, and their children. The two families would often run into each other at sporting events and neighborhood gatherings. 

Nick, Danelle, Bill and I would always gravitate to each other because we were all teachers, and not everyone was a teacher,” Marci said. “And so it was kind of fun to compare notes about what was going on in Ann Arbor and how things were going at the all different levels. 

In 2018, Marci stopped teaching at Slauson middle school and accepted a full time 

position as the district World Language Curriculum Coordinator. However, Marci soon realized she missed the classroom. Luckily for her, Danelle was looking for another French teacher due to an increased number of students hoping for a higher level French at CHS.

“I’ll forever be grateful for Danelle for thinking of me and being like ‘would you want to do this French IV class’,” Marci said. “Danelle is one of those people. Because she’s been here so long, she was my go to person to ask everything.” 

Amazingly, Marci describes their relationship in a very similar way to Danelle, even making the same comparison to Yin and Yang.

“She’s got such a calming way to her,” Marci said. “She and I work really well together because I’m so ‘whoooo’ and she’s so laid back. It’s a really good Yin and Yang sort of thing. I think we complimented each other very well.” 

Both Marci and Danelle have countless stories showcasing their beautifully balanced personalities. Marci points to an example on the last night of the school trip to France. The hotel staff had thought that the group would return in the evening instead of the afternoon, so the rooms were not ready. 

“My first reaction is like ‘what? Are you kidding me?’,” Marci said. “I just want to get in there and fight, which is not how you solve any problems. And Danelle was like, ‘What can you do to help us’. She was just so calming and I appreciated that in those moments.” 

At the same time, Marci was able to take charge when needed, which Danelle appreciated. Even after returning home from France, Marci and her husband Bill could not get enough of their pals Danelle and her husband Nick. 

“I will tell you we got back from that trip and we had so many inside jokes,” Marci said. We kept sending each other funny pictures, and then we had the over right away because we had missed them.”