The student-run publication of Stuart Hall High School | 1715 Octavia Street, San Francisco, CA 94109
Volume 14, Issue 3 | Friday, October 11, 2019
Program connects school network Global Exchange participants study abroad
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Will Burns
Reporter
he Sacred Heart network’s Global Exchange Program is looking to send students to sister schools around the world for a two to six week immersion experience with a host family. Associate Director of Admissions Greg Lobe coordinates the program that requires an online application. “Students probably aren’t aware that we had kids that we’re exchanging halfway around the world, to Europe, to South America, to Asia, to Australia,” Lobe said. The International Network of Sacred Heart Schools has over 150 schools in 44 countries, giving students a diverse array of experiences. Three current exchange options are Buenos Aires, Argentina; Barcelona, Spain and San Luis Potosi, Mexico. “Last year, in September, I went to France and stayed in a city called Nantes with my host Jules,” junior Vincent Behnke said. “It was a really incredible experience.” Students on exchange go to classes at other schools, but do
homework from back home. Participants say this approach provides students with a new viewpoint on how other cultures learn. “Jules came here in January and we had a really great time with him,” Behnke said. “He had his own schedule and went to his own classes. He went to [school trainer] Barclay [Spring] every day on his own too.” Lobe says the goal of the exchange program is to improve language skills and acclimate students to a different culture and way of life. “This world is getting smaller by the day,” Lobe said. “ It’s more important now than ever to be able to understand people who are different from you, whether that’s a different religion, a different ethnicity or from a different country.” Behnke says Jules was able to fully integrate into the Stuart Hall community and make himself at home in San Francisco. “To anyone who’s thinking of doing it, I’d say just do it,” Behnke said. “It helped my French so much, and I got by on French II. Just do it because it’s such a great opportunity.”
Vincent Behnke | With Permission
EXCHANGE BUDDIES Junior Vincent Behnke stands with exchange student Jules His while visiting a lake in Sucé-sur-Erdre near Nantes, France. Behnke went to Lycée Sacré Coeur la Perverie in September 2018, and His visited Stuart Hall in January 2019.
Major club institutes reform Students in Action seeks commited members to organize events Sartaj Rajpal & Henry Murray
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Ray O’Connor | With Permission
SERVICE UP Freshman Vlad Korostoshevskiy helps prepare bag lunches for the homeless on Sept. 15. Although Students in Action organized the first One Less Hungry event of the year, most participants were not members of the club.
Reporters
popular school service organization is undergoing restructuring after it grew exponentially last year. “Last year, we had [a lot of] students showing up weekly, but I would say of those students, a fraction of them were actually engaged in service,” Ray O’Connor, Students in Action faculty moderator, said. “The problem became how to make this team become more effective and support the goals of Students in Action while helping it to grow more purposefully and intentionally.” Rather than having students in SIA participate in the majority of service events the program organized, the leadership team has been working on getting the entirety of Convent & Stuart Hall involved in service. “The club has started to focus more on getting service events out to the community and actively participating in them,” student leader Henry Sears said. “I am looking forward to being able to accomplish more service
this year because we have better organization.” Although SIA has increased organization and productivity with a smaller group of students, approximately 50 members of the club were removed in May, leaving some students upset and confused. “It felt like I was being kicked out of a service organization that was open to the entire school,” former SIA member Jackson Cady said. “I was reluctant to join the leadership team because the group felt predetermined and somewhat exclusive.” Members of SIA leadership say they hope to re-expand to accommodate more members who are actually involved in service. “What we hope to do is to bring more people onboard through monthly general meetings that actually invite people who are helping with service, who are actually involved in service through SIA on their own,” O’Connor said. “They truly are ’Students in Action,’ so they come to the meeting being able to say, ’This is what I do and this is how I do it.’”