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the course that we're talking about is called nicaragua and change and it's part of the integrative studies program
was really great because uh... was opened all students but i hadn't really heard about it
mainly
you know sociology students but carly came
back to my apartment one day and she was like you're not going to believe where the trip is going so i was really excited
i hadn't been abroad
and it sounded like a great idea the beauty of this trip is that
fits anyone's schedule it's an integrative class
so
really it can go into anyones schedule
this semester we
went to nicaragua to visit a cooperative that we've had a
relationship with for a number of years
and we communicate with them to find out what we will do when we're together and this
year they were interested in... they already have a school they have a church they have a community center,
a youth center they just
got electricity in two thousand seven and what they needed was place for very
young children
to develop and so the project that we worked on
was working together to purchase some paints and design what this would look
like and to spend a day. it was a short project
and where we spent some time in the managa which is the capital rio blanco which is
roughly the size of keene new hampshire
so we traveled five hours from managa
the central nicaragua
and then we spent one night
in granada which is kind of a really touristy area
so it was an opportunity for
for us and the students
to really stepped outside of our culture and livin' the life
somebody from another part of the world and see something from another set of
eyes from another dimension
yeah i think it kind of opened my eyes i think again
living here in keene the majority of my life i've traveled a few places around the united states
but not until you travel out of the country and really get a different feel of how fortunate united
states it is and how much we have compared to other places
um
so yeah i was definitely eye opening it made me appreciate what i have and also
made me want to give back to people who have less and are less fortunate that we are
i definitely feel more responsibility to
engaged people on campus in and talk with them about what i saw before when
somebody would come back from
a trip abroad
you'd a look at their pictures and you'd hear the story
you can't really relate to it yourself and then once you come back you just have so
much
knowledge that you just want to share with everybody and i think that's what
really changed me being
more of a citizen of the world rather than just a citizen of keene new
hampshire or united states Sky Stevenson our global education office director
said a lovely phrase to me recently and she said we can bring keene to the world
and we can bring the world to keene and i think programs like this and there are many of
them
now on campus they do exactly that the short stay trips the ones that are a week or two
um
offer an opportunity
to a much wider population to do something
whether it's travel to another country or another part of
this country that's distant to them
that can have the same kind of cultural impact
particularly if they grew up in an area and they haven't really travelled far from it or if
they have traveled they've traveled as a tourist staying in resort hotels
they haven't seen
they haven't seen the country
if they get out there who are living in someone's home and they're doing work in
the community
they get a chance to experience life somewhere else
it makes them just that much larger it sounds a little cheesy but you learn a
lot about yourself when you just
are thrown into a situation
where you don't know the language i know a few people on the trip had some spanish in
their background
but i took french in high school the communication definitely was
difficult but then
once you get past that and you realize that we really don't need to use words
to communicate that's when you really starts opening yourself up and just kind
of
you're along for the ride just immersing yourself in the culture
so i think that the word of mouth on trips like these
are that they're incredibly positive that their there's something that is truly experiential
that they help students to learn more than they think
they can in the classroom although i think learning by reading is fine too
but it's a one more added dimension to the education they're receiving here at keene state