Brooks Campus

Morocco Hungary

Szeged, Hungary

Sarah Benjavitvilai ’23, Melanie Kaplan ’23, Philip Mwangi ’24 (Brooks hosted three students from Szeged in fall 2022)

Botswana

Gaborone, Botswana

Abbie Duckworth ’23, Mollet Otieno ’23 (Brooks hosted two students from Gaborone in spring 2023)

Brooks students have always looked beyond the borders of their campus nestled on Great Pond Road. They’ve always looked to what’s next; to what’s out there; to what they can’t yet see. The school’s signature Exchange Program, which was founded in 1986 with an exchange to Kenya, has become a beacon for that sense of exploration, independence, self-realization and excitement that defines the Brooks student.

This year, that sense of wonderment and desire to experience the larger world came back to the fore as the COVID-19 pandemic waned and travel restrictions eased. For the first time since 2019, Brooks students were able to fully engage with the Exchange Program, including exchanges to Hungary, Botswana and Morocco that took place in four- to five-week periods coinciding with the school’s Spring Break. The entire Brooks community also welcomed students from those countries to North Andover, as exchange students from abroad spent time at Brooks in stints over the fall and spring semesters.

A New Experience

For Philip Mwangi ’24, going on Exchange to Deák Ferenc in Szeged, Hungary, meant trying new things almost immediately. “I’d never been out of the country before,” he says. “I’d never been on an airplane before. I’d never even been outside of New England before. I sat in the window seat of the airplane, and just being in the plane was amazing.” Mwangi points to his experience on Exchange and calls it a “very big out-ofthe-box opportunity. It definitely challenged me to be independent and find my way around the country in ways that I never thought I would have to do on my own, even in the United States. It helped me figure out where I stand as somebody who can take care of themselves and kind of be my own person.”

Melanie Kaplan ’23, who joined Mwangi on Exchange to Hungary along with Sarah Benjavitvilai ’23, recalls fondly a key aspect of the Exchange experience: navigating airports with other Exchange students, on their own, without the guidance or assistance of an adult. “We definitely relied on each other a lot,” she says, as she laughs over unheard announcements, struggles to find departure gates, confusion over whether water bottles needed to be drained during a layover in Paris, and the like.

Abbie Duckworth ’23 and Mollet Otieno ’23, who went on Exchange to Maru-a-Pula School in Gaborone, Botswana, also successfully made it through a long international journey on their own, a fact that they’re proud of. “Out of all the Exchange students, we had the longest trip to get to where we needed to be,”

Duckworth says. “We had to take three separate flights, many with long layovers. It was tiring. But once we got there, it was so nice and so rewarding to know that we had traveled 36 hours by ourselves over multiple airports that we were not familiar with at all. And, we got to where we needed to be with no problems.”

Kaplan and Mwangi agree that they were acquaintances, but not close friends, before going on Exchange together. “I think we’d had maybe one conversation the entire time we’d been at Brooks,” Kaplan says. Mwangi observes, though, that the experience of traveling together caused them to bond.

“Throughout the time we were there, we found similar things that we both liked that we didn't know the other had an interest in, which I thought was really cool,” Mwangi says. “And we had a lot of laughs, obviously. As much as Exchange brought me closer with the world, it brought me closer with Melanie and Sarah. That was a big part of it.”

Laura Kahu ’23 traveled to The American School of Tangier in Morocco with Kat Thompson ’24, and she also treasures the bonding opportunity that Exchange brought. “Kat’s so awesome,” Kahu enthuses. “I think that if you have a big schedule and you’re busy, and if you do different things at Brooks, it’s hard to interact. And, then, Kat and I were suddenly in Morocco together and we were doing basically the same thing. So we got to see each other 24-7 and then got to just talk. It was really nice because we have a lot of things in common.”

Duckworth left the Brooks campus with a different perspective than Mwangi. Duckworth explains

Hungary

that she grew up overseas and lived in Singapore for five years, and she looked forward to re-engaging with the world following the travel restrictions that the COVID-19 pandemic made necessary. “Being able to go somewhere and meet new people who had very different life experiences from me was very nice and very refreshing,” Duckworth says. “For me, it was really about meeting new people. When you're at Brooks, you're kind of in your own little world and it's hard to think of another place outside of campus. So going somewhere new, getting out of Brooks affirmed for me that there are other places I can go, and I can see and I can meet other people.”

Otieno is from Kenya, which is in northern Africa, and she traveled to Botswana, which is in southern Africa, to experience a different country and region of her own home continent. Otieno found freedom in the ability she had to branch out, to go to a new place and to spread her wings. “It felt really good,” she says. “I learned from different people, I learned about a different culture, I learned about different foods.”

The Unscripted Moments

While on Exchange, students stay busy engaging in classes and day-today life at their host school and with their host students. They’re also asked to keep up with their assignments from Brooks while abroad. At the same time, though, the Brooksians find time to explore the nuances and quiet moments of their lives abroad, and these often lead

Morocco

to the most treasured memories of their time on Exchange.

Kaplan points to a two-day trip to Vienna, Austria, that the Hungary Exchange took from Szeged. “It was a really fun trip,” she says, describing an itinerary of no itinerary, in which the group went where they wanted to and “simply had fun.” “We played card games all night,” Kaplan says. “We sat around and listened to music.” Mwangi continues where Kaplan leaves off: “We went to a pizza shop, sat there, and had a great time. To us, that was Austria.”

Kaplan also recalls another trip to visit her host family’s extended relatives. She explains that it was the first time she had spent an extended amount of time without another student from Brooks with her. The trip, Kaplan says, gave her a chance to bond with her host family, and get a slice of what life in Hungary is like without the familiar crutch of a Brooks classmate to lean on.

Mwangi, meanwhile, recalls the unscripted moments spent exploring Szeged after school with his classmates and new friends. “We went to Station East Square a lot, which is in the middle of Szeged,” he says. Kaplan describes the location as a downtown area with cafes to sample, as well as a Starbucks whose food and drink, Mwangi says, tasted better than the Starbucks at home. “I think all the food tastes better there,” Mwangi says. “Everything was good. I really liked it.”

“We went to the mall,” he says. “We went to eat. We simply went sightseeing. The town is beautiful. I think the kids who live there don’t think it’s that pretty, but we think it’s really beautiful.” Kaplan agrees. “It was gorgeous,” she says. “All the architecture is beautiful. It’s all these different pastels; it’s colorful and vibrant.”

From her time in Botswana, Duckworth remembers a trip to a rhinoceros sanctuary and a hike to a waterfall that is considered sacred. “That entire trip was really eye-opening,” she says. “There were so many beautiful parts of the country that I was able to see.” Duckworth also points to a musical salon that was held the Friday before she and Otieno headed back to North Andover, which was packed with students and in which she jubilantly participated and attempted to learn Botswanan dances, guided by her roommate and with her new friends.

“I failed miserably. I was totally awful,” Duckworth laughs. “I was switching my feet up. It was a lot, but it was still so fun to be a part of that community. I felt so easily accepted into that community that it was not awkward for us to dance together, and that was really nice.”

Going Abroad to Find Yourself

Mwangi and Kaplan agree that, by far, the most valuable discovery they each made while in Hungary was themselves. Kaplan, who does not speak Hungarian, explains that the language barrier she faced often left her unable to listen in on or participate in conversations with people around her in cafes or restaurants. “You get to spend a lot of time with yourself and just being with your own presence,” she says.

Botswana

“It gives you a moment to reflect on a lot of life experiences. I've definitely brought that back with me to Brooks.”

Mwangi appreciates the ways in which he learned to communicate despite the language barrier. He says he focused on using methods of nonverbal communication. “I appreciated being able to communicate in different ways to express how I'm feeling and what I want without using language, and trying to use different ways to do that,” he says. “Finding ways to talk to people and understand them without using language was a big part of my experience.”

Kahu expands on this point, and notes that in her experience, the Moroccan population tends to speak multiple languages. “In the United States, we’re really stuck on English,” she says. “We can speak

Hungary

English for everything, and it gets us where we need to go. We can learn French or Spanish, but it’s not necessary to know French or Spanish to communicate in America. In Morocco, though, there are a load of influences, so people speak French, along with Arabic and Spanish. It was really interesting to understand that I wasn’t going to be able to communicate with everybody. My roommate could speak five different languages.”

Kahu also became more aware of her intersectionality and the privileges she carries through her exchange. “In the United States, I know where I stand as a Black girl,” she says. “In Morocco, it was something similar but different. It was interesting and I was really aware of that.” Kahu’s host family claims a variety of ethnic backgrounds and identities, and she says that she was aware of their differences as they went through their days. “Going through the markets, we were cognizant of the fact that we don’t necessarily look like everybody, but we can still be fully engrossed in and be a part of this community because of the experience that we share,” she says. She says that the family “definitely got a lot of looks when we were all together,” but continues that “it teaches you a lot about your place in the world, and how that’s reflected in other people just by who you are, how you speak; all of that.”

Duckworth applauds the opportunity the Exchange Program gives Brooks students to go on exchange while they’re still in high school. “Being able to go outside of the United States and see new people who have had very different life experiences than you is very eye-opening,” she says. “It humbles you. If you’re in high school and you get this opportunity, you should take it.”

About The Exchange Program

The Exchange Program was founded in 1986 to promote the global education of Brooks students and students from partner schools abroad. Since its inception, the program has allowed more than 600 students from Brooks and partner schools to go on exchange. Former Brooks assistant headmaster Richard Holmes began the program with two boys’ boarding schools in Africa: The Alliance High School, outside of Nairobi, Kenya, and Diocesan College (Bishops), in Cape Town, South Africa.

By living abroad in other school communities for a few weeks, students get the chance to extend themselves and their comfort level as they adjust to a new place, a new culture and new people. They also welcome the opportunity to take these experiences with them back to Brooks and into their lives. This transformative experience, one of the enduring highlights of its participants’ Brooks experiences, makes our students more empathetic and engaged citizens of our increasingly diverse and global society.

While the expectations of the exchanges are the same across the program, the nuances vary according to the location. Depending on whether the partner school is a boarding school or a day school, students will live in dorms or with the families of students who come on exchange to Brooks. Students participate in their host school’s extracurricular activities and also pursue their individual interests. They attend classes daily and take the equivalent of four majors while also keeping up with their Brooks classes. And, they take time to travel in and around their host countries.