From October 7 to October 21, Boston Latin School students hosted 15 German exchange students from the Korbinian Aigner Gymnasium (KAG) school as part of a program organized by Boston Latin School German teacher Frau Heidemarie Floerke.
Frau Floerke and Frau Leeb, a teacher at KAG, started planning the program in December 2022, taking months of communication and effort in preparation for the exchange. This was Frau Floerke’s fourth year organizing an exchange program with KAG.
Frau Floerke asserts, “[The exchange program] allows a person to widen their horizons, to gain a glimpse into the life of another person in another country with another culture so different from [one’s] own.”
Planning the trip, as well as choosing the hosts for exchange students, was a lengthy and difficult process. First, the teacher had to approve students whom they thought would be an acceptable host. Then, the BLS students filled out an application that would match them with a German student with similar interests. Ming Hern (II) elaborates, “You had to fill up a lot of questionnaires about things about your home life, interests, family members, pets, animals, things like that, who are suited for hosting someone.”
Once the hosts and exchange students were paired, they were required to keep in contact for the whole summer so that BLS students would be prepared to go to Germany as part of their exchange student experience.
Frau Floerke had organized similar exchange programs with KAG for three years while she taught at Lexington High School. After she began teaching at BLS, Lexington High discontinued the exchange program. Frau Floerke says, “It seemed natural to ask them [KAG] to partner with me and BLS. The pairing between U.S. students and German students is done very thoughtfully and carefully in the hopes that deep cross-cultural friendships and bonds may develop between the students and across oceans.”
The exchange program, which started in 2019, thus continued for the next four years. Once the program began this October, the German students had a busy schedule. They attended school with their hosts and lived in their host families’ homes. They also went on a few field trips, visiting the State House and City Hall to meet BLS alumni State Representative Brandy Oakley (‘01) and Steven Gringras (‘13).
Following the program, the German exchange students reflected that they learned a lot about the cultural differences between America and their home country. Xenia Matthews (II) said that her student, Laura, was very surprised, wondering why everything is bigger in the U.S. than in Germany.
At school, the exchange students shadowed their hosts. Matthews adds, “My German exchange student was familiar with the concepts that we were learning, though not in-depth because she was actually a grade younger than me. But for other subjects, like U.S. history, she didn’t know much about it because this is not her country, but she was able to follow a lot of the conversations that were happening in class.”
Overall, both the German and BLS students found the exchange program to be a great experience. Hern states, “I think it’s really incredible that these German students and these BLS kids can just go on a plane all the way to another place and spend two weeks in that culture and absorb the information how it is to be the people from the other culture.”
Although this program took nearly a year to plan, many agreed that it was a worthwhile experience. In addition to forming unforgettable memories and new friendships, the exchange program brought new opportunities for students to step out of their comfort zones. As Frau Floerke concludes, “[The exchange] shakes you up and makes you see that there is so much more out there to discover and experience. We so easily get lost in our routines and become frightened and hesitant to try new things. [Experiences like these] teach us so much, make us more interesting and in my opinion, a happier being as a result.”