Last year the students in Lisa Finnegan’s French class were told about a possible French exchange happening in 2024. The students were ecstatic after finding out about the opportunity to have students from France here at The Morgan School. Mme Finnegan has run an exchange program for 7 years and she says it’s always even more successful than she ever thought it would be. This year there will be 16 total students coming from France, 10 of them will be staying with students from Morgan and 6 will be staying with students from Haddam-Killingworth High School.
While the French students are here they will be traveling from class to class with their host student and visiting elective classes such as culinary, physical education, and art to get a feel of the types of classes we take here in the United States. The class will also spend a day in New Haven, touring the Yale campus and visiting the Yale Art Museum. If approved by the school Mme Finnegan would also like to take them to Boston for a day.
Mme Finnegan enjoys doing these exchanges and would like to continue to run this program. Mme Finnegan expresses her feelings about the student connections made and the new perspective the students get from this experience. She loves seeing the connections made between her students and the French students. She said some people are still in touch with the students they hosted. For the best results, Mme Finnegan hand-selects the pairs of students based on their interests. For example she looks at if they are athletic or shy or if they have any allergies and matches them up with one of her students who she thinks would be compatible.
This opportunity will benefit the students participating.
Some of the students here at Morgan shared their excitement about the exchange. Sophomore Abby Stack says she can’t wait to show the French students around and introduce them to her friends and family. This will be a learning experience for all who are involved, students will expand their French vocabulary and the students coming here will get to indulge themselves in American culture. Juniors Ava and Olivia Ruotolo, both French students who feel they can have a conversation in French as long as it’s slow and not too hard to understand. Overall this is an amazing program that all the students are going to benefit and learn from as the French students immerse themselves in U.S culture and the Morgan students get the opportunity to further their understanding of the language.
