EDITORIAL

An adventure to last a lifetime

“I'm looking forward to just seeing how the locals live because I feel like it can change me, because I tend to be a very materialistic person. I want to change that.” These were the words of Oliver Ames High School student Marcus Hammett as he prepared to depart for Peru this past summer with four of his fellow students and OA history teacher Debbie Salisbury. This week, Salisbury described their month-long summer adventure in Cusco, Peru, the former Inca capital. They experienced Peru by flight, by bus and on foot. They visited an Andean school outside Cusco where they did community service. They dealt with rain-soaked tents, a 22-hour bus ride and switchback mountain roads. They also sampled unfamiliar foods, made friends and visited ruins and other sites. The trip, organized through World Challenge of Britain and paid for by students, seeks to build participants' self-confidence and leadership through immersion in a Third World culture.

It did just that.

The trip had a lasting impact on all who went. Four are now seniors at OAHS and a fifth is now in college. Salisbury described how each student rose to the challenges of his or her journey in different ways. Roberta Anderson and Colin Basler showed strong leadership. Hammett shared a great sense of humor. Jonny Monnin kept track of the group's finances and Morgan McCafferty's ability to speak Spanish was a great contribution. Marisa Pushee captured the experiences of each day in her journal with first-rate observation and analysis. The Peru trip was unique it that it took students to a third world country over summer vacation. It's not the only way, however, OA has worked to expose its students to other cultures.

In April, a group led by social studies teacher Eveline Johnson will spend 10 days in Greece. The students, accompanied by parent chaperones, will take educational tours. Students pay their own costs to cover the trip and earn course credit for their travels. Here in the United States it is difficult to imagine daily life without food, clean water, a safe and dry place to sleep, smoothly paved highways and other luxuries. The Peru travelers learned to appreciate those pleasures all at the same time. It's a feeling they have virtually every day at home and previously took for granted. It's a lesson that will give them appreciation for their daily comforts and greater empathy for others, like the hurricane victims in Florida or the people suffering in Iraq, Afghanistan and Sudan.

Programs that expose young people to life outside the U.S. are invaluable as are the teachers willing to give their time to accompany students. These particular students from Oliver Ames were offered the chance to walk in someone else's shoes, to see another land, and to meet other people. They seized that chance and grew from it. That is what education is all about.

Editorial, Easton Journal
24 September 2004

http://www2.townonline.com/easton/opinion/view.bg?articleid=91532

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