From left to right: Fanny Carolle, senior Lauren Flickner, senior Gabby Hakes, Théa Preau, and junior Caitlin Clark.
When Théa Preau and Fanny Carolle started at University High School on Monday, August 20, it wasn’t the schedule or the food or the language that surprised them most. It was, in true University fashion, all the talking.
“In France, we don’t really talk to each other,” said Preau. “Even in the high school, the teachers are more distant so we don’t really talk to them. They are there to teach and that’s all.”
“Here I think students know that they can talk to their teachers,” she added.
Trailblazers in their own right, Preau and Carolle are the first two students to participate in a new exchange program University has established with Lycée Saint André, a school in Niort, France. Preau and Carolle are seniors at the French school, and they are spending three weeks studying at University and living with the families of senior Gabby Hakes and junior Caitlin Clark, respectively. Hakes and senior Lauren Flickner will then spend the three weeks of January Term 2019 in France living with Preau’s and Carolle’s families, respectively, and studying at their school.
“I’ve always wanted to do an exchange,” said Flickner. “I lived in France when I was younger, and I’ve been there multiple times since, but I’ve never been to a French school. I attended the American School in Paris, so everything was taught in English. I’m excited to experience an actual French school.”
Exchange student Théa Preau (second from left) helps students in a French 3 class practice their speaking skills.
While the course requirements at University High School are different from Lycée Saint André (where they track students after their first year, so Carolle, for example, is in a “literature” track and doesn’t typically take math or science classes), Preau and Carolle feel similarly about the experience of attending an American school. Preau hopes to be a teacher in the U.S. one day, so the experience here has been informative. Carolle has a different ambition.
“I decided to come to the United States because I want to go to psychology college,” said Carolle. “All the books will be in English, so if I’m not fluent it will be really hard.”
While University High School has a long history of hosting international students from Guatemala, Norway, Japan, and other countries, this is the first true exchange program available to students. Establishing international exchanges and exploring ways for University students to study and travel abroad has been a primary goal of the international programs department since Shannon Swann took over in 2016.
This partnership was facilitated in part by French and ENL instructor Christopher Hindsley, who had established a similar exchange program with Lycée Saint André at his previous school.
“We morphed the exchange program from six weeks to three weeks to better fit with University High School’s smaller student body and three-week J-Term,” said Hindsley. “We’ll do these three-week exchanges for the next two years with the hope that eventually we’ll be able to take a group of students to France, perhaps during spring break or in the summer.”
Preau and Carolle will present a morning meeting on Thursday, Sept. 6 about their experience at University High School. All are welcome to attend and wish the students well as they return home at the end of next week.