Over Feb. break, students in the French and Spanish exchange programs at Lexington High School traveled to Switzerland and Spain to fully immerse themselves in their respective languages for two weeks.
The exchange program consisted of two parts: in September, students from Spain and Switzerland visited Lexington, and the following February, students from LHS went to their exchange classmates’ schools.
Each student from LHS was paired up with a Spanish or Swiss student during the exchange program. Students kept in touch with their exchange partners through social media.
“I feel like I was more comfortable for this trip because we hosted the Spanish students at the end of the year last year. So before we even went to Spain, we already knew our Spanish partners, and we knew the group that we were going to meet because they came to Lexington first,” Giorgia Tan, a senior who participated in the Spanish exchange program, said.
Students believed they also developed a greater sense of community with fellow classmates who went on the exchange trip.
“While we were in Spain, we bonded more because we were all in a foreign country together, and we were going through the same things,” Tan said.
Along with forming new friendships, the trip provided opportunities for students to not only learn about other cultures but also teach others about their own experiences.
“In our French classes and in their English classes, the students who are traveling to the place give presentations. So they presented on Swiss traditional sports and food and regions, and we presented on prom and fast food,” Beckie Bray Rankin, a French teacher and chaperone for the French exchange, said.
The trip also inspired teachers to think of creative methods to promote language learning inside the classroom.
“For me as a teacher, [the exchange trip] gives me more material to engage students in teaching,” Mónica Sanderson, a Spanish teacher and chaperone for the Spanish exchange, said. “You don’t know how much you can apply until you have these kinds of trips.”
In addition, teachers believe going on the exchange trip can help students significantly improve their language proficiency.
“We have data from 2017 that 80% of the students increased an entire proficiency level by spending those two weeks abroad, versus here, it could take a year and a half of school to increase that much,” Brankin said.
During the trip, students also formed meaningful relationships with their host families and exchange partners. These experiences have inspired students to pursue study abroad programs in the future.
“Many of the students end up doing travel abroad or study abroad because [the trip] is kind of like a stepping stone for that,” Rankin said.
