When 10 students in Interact — a new program developed by members of the International Relations Council — visited the Trenton Daylight/Twilight High School last semester to teach world affairs, they discovered that most of the high school students were surprisingly capable of translating their knowledge of local and personal issues to the global stage.
Using analogies related to their everyday lives in Trenton — bringing the material "down to a level they can relate to"— allowed the students to see the fundamental issues at hand, Sashank Rishyasringa '06 said.
Put simply, "They were very capable people," Leon Skornicki '06 said.
These weren't typical high school students, however. The Daylight/Twilight High School is a two-year alternative program for students who either dropped out or were in danger of failing out of their previous high schools. Enrollment is voluntary, and students can stand up and leave at any point without punishment.
To introduce these students to the importance of world affairs, Interact visited the school from Oct. to Dec. 2005, teaching geography, the media, interventions and international organizations.
Rishyasringa and Safiyy Momen '07 were surprised by how much the students knew about Bush and Iraq, despite little knowledge about other international issues.
"We expected them to be sheltered," Momen said, but "they had opinions about Bush" that were primarily negative.
After four weeks, however, "we changed gear to make sure they saw both sides by presenting alternative arguments," Momen said.
They had "practical knowledge, street smarts," Rishyasringa said. "They know a lot about Iraq and had a sense of [what] bias [is]." And when Rishyasringa tried to relate their life experiences to world issues, "they were able to pick up."
In one of the sessions, the Interact volunteers had the students look at the tags on their clothes to see where they came from. When they discovered that they all had at least one article of clothing from another country, "that was the first time they realized it is important to deal with other countries," Skornicki said.
"We wanted to teach them that other people around the world have all sorts of problems, that other people share their problems and that by interacting, we can solve problems," he added.
Over the few months Interact volunteered at the high school, the student response changed. "The first day we arrived, we said we were Princeton students," Skornicki said, "and the students seemed to think, "Why are they here, why do they care?"
The high schoolers warmed up over time, however, and by the last discussion everybody was talking, Skornicki added.
The level of participation "varied a lot," Rishyasringa said. There were "some who seemed positively disinterested and others were constantly contributing."
He was gratified when a student said, "Well, you're biased" after the supervising teacher had made a comment, applying the material Rishyasringa had taught them.
The students were not "ultra-respectful or politically correct," Rishyasringa said. Nevertheless, they were "making big sacrifices to be in school ... there was never a problem with discipline."
Since students are not required to stay through a full day of class at Daylight/Twilight, Skornicki was happy that after the first week, "they knew we were coming the next week and they chose to stay."
The high school students were not the only ones affected by the program — the volunteers were as well. "Foreign policy has always been really important to me," Emily Norris '09 said. "This program challenged me to say why we have a foreign policy and how we can affect foreign policy."
Next semester, Interact will add an extra session, and volunteers hope to build even stronger relationships with the Trenton students.
The volunteers also hope to prepare a group of high schoolers to attend the Princeton Model United Nations Conference. Finances still have to be worked out, since these students would not be expected to cover the fees involved.
But if they do come, it will be a valuable experience. They can "learn that they aren't that different form other students there," Skornicki said.
Original URL: http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2006/02/07/14373/