Students Brandi Boese, senior, and Diana Stanley, junior, traveled to India last week on Newman University’s first ambassador trip to the Bangalore Chapter of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ.
“They are helping as interns,” said Professor of History Cheryl Golden, Ph.D. “They work with both young students and the sisters themselves to develop their English language skills. Also, they are working with students on math, art and music.”
Boese, an elementary education major, started a blog to talk about the trip and her experiences working with the sisters at Aradhana Academy – a K-12 school in Bangalore.
During the first week, the students spent a great deal of time recovering from the flight, getting settled and experiencing Bangalore. Boese said the real work began this week when she and Stanley taught classes for the first time.
Boese taught three math classes, a communications class, reading and transcription/diction, and both students taught communications classes for the sisters that evening.
“It was a little hard because I am not familiar with their curriculum or standards, but, overall, it was pretty good,” Boese wrote in her blog.
“Diana and Brandi have to be nimble, maintain big smiles and a great sense of adventure and humor,” Golden said.
The students have also experienced Bangalore’s cuisine, currency, traffic and English mass, which Boese mentioned was only slightly different from mass in the U.S.
Before leaving, Boese was excited to learn more about the differences between American and Indian educational systems – especially because she wants to teach overseas after graduation.
“More on that when I have more experience in the classrooms,” she wrote in her blog.
