Students foster peace abroad

On July 5, Williston Middle School students Shelby Pederson, 13, and Ali Wells, 14, returned from a 20-day trip which spanned six different European countries and marked their first overseas experience.

All of this happened thanks to a nationwide ambassador program headquartered in Spokane, Wash. called People to People, and both girls were chosen to be a part of the trip after receiving letters of recommendation and going through an interview process.

Their delegation included other students from Williston, Bismarck, Fargo, Minot, Dickinson and Montana. This is just the second year this program is being offered here, so it is fairly new to North Dakota.

The program was founded in 1956 under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who set out to develop a program of personal exchanges and firsthand experiences with other cultures. Today, People to People ambassadors have the opportunity to travel to 34 countries located on all seven continents and the program is available for many different age groups.

Pederson and Wells’ particular ambassador trip began on June 16, when their group left the Bismarck Municipal Airport for Europe. After flying into London they stayed there for two days and then took an overnight ferry to France (which contained over 1,000 rooms sleeping four people each). The group stayed in France for four days, spent one day in Belgium, two days in the Netherlands, six days in Germany and wrapped up the tour with four days in Switzerland.

A few notable sights that Pederson and Wells were able to see were the Louvre, the Tower of London, Versailles, Notre Dame, the Peace Palace and the Beaches of Omaha.

They had their own bus driver and tour guide, and brought back many souvenirs from their travels.

When arriving at Omaha Beach, the group was given a welcome by the Mayor of a town called Saint-Laurent sur-Mer. Later on in Germany, both Pederson and Wells were able to participate in a homestay, and they agreed that this was one of the highlights of the trip.

Of course, the main goal of this program is to create peace between different countries and bring about cultural understanding.

The girls participated in a service project in Freiburg (Germany), in which they pulled Japanese weeds that were overtaking the riverbed there, and also participated in scavenger hunts through the program to foster communication with the locals in the places they traveled.

As for the language barrier, they agreed that German and French were the easiest to understand because of their close relation to the English language.

The girls were also able to meet people from all over the U.S., and met students from California, Kansas, Louisiana, Montana and North Dakota who were in the same program.

While they were abroad, they completed journals and other homework assignments for the program which included their thoughts and feelings about everything they were taking in.

“It was a shock to get back,” said Wells. “Everything is so flat!”

The two also mentioned a few differences that surprised them, for example they often saw five separate garbage cans in addition to recycling, and the cars there are much smaller and quite fuel efficient.

“We saw 31 trucks while we were there, and the rest were small cars,” said Pederson.

And with gas reaching $12 a gallon in England (or $3 a liter) these smaller vehicles are cost efficient too.

In most places they went, Wells said it cost them about 50 cents to use the bathroom which was a new experience for them.

Wells said she really enjoyed Switzerland, while Pederson’s favorite country that they visited was Germany.

“Switzerland was just beautiful, and the Black Forest in Germany was so different from anything in North Dakota,” said Wells.

In Switzerland, they were able to go whitewater rafting and night hiking, where they were able to see Austria, Italy and Luxembourg from atop the mountains at night.

Before leaving, the group met in Washburn, four times and were advised about what and how to pack, and were also able to meet some of the other students before traveling with them.

The leaders of the program made all of the decisions about the itinerary, and students found out all of this information in addition to which countries they would visit just 20 days before they left.

Although Pederson was only able to call home once, she said they could answer e-mails fairly quickly and find places with free or cheap internet access whenever they found time in between their busy schedules.

Shelby’s mother, Karen McDaniel, also had a few comments about the program.

“It was kind of scary to send them away with a program I had never heard of before,” she said. But I was very impressed with it, their safety precautions and classes before they left were very good. It was just an amazing experience for them.”

She said it is great to see a program like this giving local kids in Williston this kind of opportunity to travel abroad.

All three said they would recommend this program to other students who qualify to participate. To find out how you can get involved with People to People or to get an application form, visit their Web site at www.ptpi.org.