St. Vincent School students push back borders
By Sara Weikel, Cottonwood/Holladay Journal (March 1, 2010)

Students visiting St. Vincent de Paul School from the John F Kennedy Primary School in Guadalajara

The world expanded recently for St. Vincent de Paul School students and their families.

St. Vincent's and John F. Kennedy Primary School in Guadalajara, Mexico, have been exchanging students for four years now. The current trade saw 13 Kennedy sixth graders in Salt Lake City Feb. 8-22. Twelve St. Vincent's sixth graders and one seventh grader left for Guadalajara Feb. 27, and will return home Mar. 15.

"What we want to do is expose our kids to another culture," said St. Vincent's Principal Mark Longe.

Seeing a modern Mexican city like Guadalajara will help the students dispel stereotypes Americans tend to have about Mexico, Longe said. With a population of about 5 million, Guadalajara is the second largest city in Mexico.

While there, the students are experiencing the full range of what Guadalajara has to offer, from cathedrals and pyramids to the city's modern downtown, as well as the beach and soccer games. They will also get to practice Spanish language skills and see what Mexican family life is like as they stay with families of Kennedy students.

Living with host families "kind of opens their eyes" because they get to see how people actually live instead of just the vacation spots, said Marylynn Ulibarri, mom of twins who are part of the exchange program.

The Ulibarri family also hosted two of the Kennedy girls while they were here in Salt Lake.

The Kennedy students experienced some American culture here in the form of Utah Jazz and Grizzly games, seeing downtown Salt Lake's historical places, eating out and skiing.

"For some of the students, it's the first time they've ever seen snow," said Kennedy Principal Paul Guenther, who accompanied his students on the trip.

English practice was an even larger part of the trip for the Kennedy students than Spanish was for the St. Vincent's students. Bilingual education is highly valued in Mexico, and not easy to obtain, Guenther said.

Kennedy students go through preschool learning only in English, and spend kindergarten through sixth grade in dual language instruction in most subjects.

"This is an opportunity for our students to practice English in a setting that is not in the classroom," Guenther said.

Guenther's family founded the Kennedy school 35 years ago so he and his sisters could have a bilingual education. Guenther was close to the age of the current exchange students at the time. His own roots are in both countries, as his mother is from Mexico and his father is from Ohio. Guenther and his older sister were born in Ohio, but spent most of their childhood in Guadalajara. The family moved to Salt Lake City when he was a teenager because his younger sister was at Shriner's Hospital for some time. Guenther graduated from Judge Memorial High School and the University of Utah.

The experience of visiting another country can be life-changing for a child, and can encourage them to make choices to travel and learn languages in the future, Longe said.

"It really kind of opens up the world to them," he said.

Photos courtesy of the Cottonwood/Holladay Journal