2nd part

Welcome to "Europe for the Youth".

This week we will discuss the project developed by Hisar School for the Comenius school partnership program: the 'Intersection of Cultures'. Their partner in Europe is the 'Externat Notre Dame' high school. In our previous program we talked about the project with the teachers who acted as coordinators, and this time it is the turn of the students.

We would like to present you the experiences of the participating students.

The project 'the Intersection of Cultures' was organized in connection with Comenius, one of the European Union's educational programs. The participating schools were the Externat Notre Dame from France, and Hisar School from Turkey, and the project was student-centered. The activities covered history, art and literature. The students staged a play, they made a short film with the pictures and images they took, they challenged their creativity with a fashion show.

French teacher: "Because we thought that it is important for our students to use their skills. They are very creative. They like to create new things, to transform existing things, they are especially gifted in art."

In our previous program we talked about the Intersection of Cultures project with the project coordinators. Now it is the turn of the students.

"Why are you here?"
A French student: "Because I want to discover the world, and I think it is an interesting project."

"And you?"
A French student: "We are actually part of this project. We applied to be in the project, and I think it is really interesting to come here, to get a chance to work on our English, and it enriches us."

"Were these the reasons why you applied to this project in the beginning?"
A French student: "I thought it would be interesting to visit Turkey. You know that there are big discussions in France about Turkey's adherence to the European Union. This is why I wanted to come here and see how the Turkish people live, what they think about that."

"Before you came here, did you have any prejudices about Turkey? After all, what is written about Turkey doesn't reflect the reality most of the time."
A French student: "I actually didn't have any prejudice. Before coming, I tried not to think about how Turkey would be, or the Turkish people."

Still, the image of Turkey in the mind of the French students was different before they came.
A Turkish teacher: "When we asked them for pictures representing Turkey, they sent us interesting images: most of the pictures had a camel, an oasis, a desert, or an inscription that read 'caliph'. First, we debated with the students about how we could erase these prejudices."

It is certainly difficult to defeat instantly the prejudices that built up along the years. However, with creative strategies, it is not entirely impossible.

A Turkish student: "In the art department, we decided to explore the Anatolian civilizations for the Comenius project. We planned a large organization, this program started last year. First, we studied the historical development, from the Bronze Age to the Ottomans, from ancient civilizations to the era of empires. My responsibility was to work on drawings. I designed a fashion collection with a modernized look."

"The fashion show is just one of the many aspects of the project. What are the other activities?"
A Turkish student: "We worked on a project called Light and Architecture. We also organized art exhibitions. 'Light and Architecture' was a joint project."
A Turkish student: "We took pictures around Taksim and Dolmabahçe for Light and Architecture; then, together with the pictures that were sent from France, we organized an exhibition at our school."
A Turkish student: "This was a partnership project, therefore we started to work on the projects simultaneously. We sent the pictures to each other and held our exhibitions at the same time. Another project was 'Belonging and Exclusion'. We worked on the body. Up here you see some samples. We displayed these works in St. Sophia."

The students took the leading role in the activities. The teachers' sole responsibility was to provide guidance to the students.

A Turkish student: "In fact, the projects are our own, but, as we continually shared with our teachers, they supported our ideas and further developed them, and thus we attained a better achievement."

As part of the project, first the Turkish students went to France, to the Externat Notre Dame high school, and later on the French students came to Turkey. For the students of both high schools, these trips provided an opportunity to discover diversity.

A French student: "I think it is very different here, maybe because the students here pay a lot of money for the school. In our school, we don't pay, I mean, we pay less than here. After all, it is a state school. And nobody works that hard at our school. In fact, many things don't exist, compared with what we see here, because, in France, the state gives money to the schools, and the education system is different. It is more easygoing here, they are free to do as they want in school."

A Turkish student: "At the beginning the biggest difference was the school days: we had to go to school on Saturday as well. It was quite an experience to compare with Istanbul the lifestyle and the city planning of Grenoble, which is a small town. We all live in different areas of the city: she lives in Kemerburgaz, and I, in Yesilköy, which means we are one hour apart from each other. Consequently, it is hard for us to get together after school. But in Grenoble the students were always in a group; friends met after school, during the lunch breaks, on weekends."

There was a lot to do for the students within the time that they spent together: they had a limited time to merge the work that they had done separately, to give the final touch. Therefore the project 'the Intersection of Cultures' was no easy task for the students. The greatest difficulty was the lack of time.

A French student: "We had a lot of things to do, we had to prepare a play and a fashion show, and we were also asked to write a short story. And there were trips and homework. It was very hard to do all that at the same time."

In fact, time wasn't the only issue for the students in this project. However, with the support of their parents and teachers, they overcame all the difficulties.

A Turkish student: "We had to stay at school, to miss classes to prepare all this. Both our teachers and our parents have been a great help."

A Turkish student: "I really believe that we are very lucky, because our school supports us, our parents support us. On the other hand, the entrance exam to the Turkish universities is very important for us, but it is a great benefit to participate in activities and to be involved in social contacts. I feel that it isn't right to have a life focused on exams, because such activities help us develop our individuality, to achieve something on our own."

Another activity of the Intersection of Cultures project was a fashion show. The students presented themselves the outfits that they have designed and sewn.

"The fashion show is tonight. You are dressed in the outfits of the collection. You are the designer, what did you have in mind when you designed the clothing?"
A Turkish student: "My friend represents the Urartu. As you know, numerous steles were discovered from the Urartu civilization. I looked at the designs there, I used the visual material, and of course, I used today's fashion style as I designed these new clothes. And truly, when we research the Urartus, we can see that their clothes look like these ones; for example, the color. You can explain about purple."

A Turkish student: "Along the history, the purple has been representative of royalty. This has always been so, for example during the Byzantine Empire. Whenever we come across purple, we can see that nobility wore this color. There has always been a class distinction in history. In this system, we saw that the highest class always wore purple. The Urartus also had a significant class distinction, this is why the purple gained importance in relation with the Urartus."

The aim of the project was interdisciplinary collaboration, and intercultural dialogue. It offered an opportunity to the students to develop themselves. At the same time, they have been an inspiration to other schools, students, and teachers.

A Turkish student: "My mother is also a teacher; she works at another school. After she saw what I have been doing, she wanted to initiate the same project at her school and applied to the national agency. The project became a model to many people."

For more details about the Comenius program or to develop a Comenius project at your school, you can visit the web page of the national agency.