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An RFH Foreign Exchange Student Experience

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It was a Rumson-Fair Haven Regional High School (RFH) foreign exchange student experience to remember.

A little more than a week ago, 22 Spanish exchange students from Isabel de Castilla, in Avila, Spain, said goodbye to their hosts, current RFH students and their families, after a weeklong immersive visit to the United States.

RFH student Ella Rome shared, “The exchange program is a unique opportunity that feels like building a family in a different country. I’m so grateful to have participated in this experience.” Seth Herman, supervisor of World Languages, Fine and Performing Arts, Health and Physical Education, and ESL, added, “This program has provided an invaluable experience to all of our language learners; it fosters cultural connections, hones linguistic skills, and forms lifelong friendships that our students will take with them wherever they go.”

Their visit, from March 14 to 22, marked the sixth time that Isabel de Castilla has traveled here as part of the sister school partnership that was established by Christina Gauss, RFH Spanish teacher, and Aida Marquez, Isabel de Castilla’s principal and bilingual program English teacher, back in 2016.

Since then, RFH students have also visited Isabel de Castilla in Avila and other Spanish cities and towns three times. Gauss and Marquez have collaborated on multiple presentations, sharing their experiences and the opportunities for students they provide, most notably at the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese (AATSP) conference in Salamanca, Spain.

The visit was thoughtfully planned to provide a truly experiential learning experience for all students involved from both IC and RFH. Months ahead, students are paired with their hosts and begin communicating online to get to know each other before their seven-night homestays.

When here, Spanish students attend RFH for three days to get a feel for the American high school experience and culture where they interacted with all RFH students, volunteered at RFH’s Empty Bowls community fundraising event, participated in school spirit days, attended Matilda, RFH’s spring musical, and a lacrosse game and participated in a roundtable with Diego Blazquez, Education Attache from NYC’s Spanish Consulate Education Office, RFH administrators, students and teachers.

The roundtable included the participation of Fiona Lenahan, a new Spanish teacher at RFH and Bulldog alum, who is a participant in the sister school program herself as a two-time student host and traveler to Avila.

With their host families, the Spanish students participated in American routines and traditions and also got a taste of local Jersey Shore culture by visiting local stories and places like Sea Bright beach, Twin Lights, Sandy Hook, Pete and Elda’s Pizzeria, and Lighthouse Italian Ice. Their Rumson visit was bookended by a night in New York City with their chaperones and on a joint field trip with RFH students to the City of Brotherly Love.

The sister school partnership, was created in support of RFH’s mission, “to empower all of our students with the tools to find their passions and thrive as knowledgeable, confident, resilient, creative, and compassionate citizens of a global community.” It is something that both RFH and IC commit strongly to maintaining year after year through collaborative students projects, online chats and communication, and reciprocal visits.

At Isabel de Castilla, students take English, Biology, and Social Studies classes in English for the duration of their 7th through 10th grade equivalent years.

At RFH, all students studying Spanish interact with IC students in a variety of ways. Ella and Olivia Rome, current seniors at RFH, have participated in the program three years in a row, hosting multiple Spanish exchange students twice and visiting Avila themselves.

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