Many a tears were shed as the bus pulled away after a very early morning wake up before 4 AM to get to the Frankfurt airport. Many students did not want to return they had such a good time and felt like were just settling in to the calmer small town life of Sarreguemines. It's been an awesome trip and hard to believe that the trip has already come to a close. Closing Triller: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WL1irXYOTLY... read more

On Wednesday we took the entire day to visit Strasbourg as it was a few hours away and we added a visit to the European Union to our schedule. Our tour at the E.U. included seeing the debate floor, administrative buildings, and a tour around the architecturally stunning facilities. Along with Luxembourg and Brussels, Strasbourg is the home of the third piece of the decentralized E.U. headquarters where things as diverse as food safety policy, trade, agricultural subsidies, monetary policy, and foreign relations are discussed and new laws are created. It was a unique experience for French and American students traveling together to learn more about government first hand and ask questions up close. Our guide told us that contrary to many outsiders' believes about Europe, individual citizens actually only pay 3 Euros per year in ... read more

It's been an extremely busy trip with a jam packed schedule of activities. We are having a great time and the exchange has been wonderful so far. Monday we had a good opportunity to get to know more about the local history of Sarreguemines with some locally based tours. We spent most of the morning at the earthenware or ceramics museum learning about the industry that supported the economy and defined this town culturally and artistically. We also toured some of the neighborhoods where the workers lived and places they went for entertainment. We saw the remains of the original kilns from the 19th century as well. In the afternoon we walked to a mill and learned about the production side of the earthenware industry and a few students even got to practice making a few ... read more

It was an early wake up and departure at 4 AM and a late return after midnight but it was well worth the effort. In one day we traveled to the famous must see French destination and squeezed as many things in as we could. We visited (although didn't have time to explore) the Louvre, Eiffel Tower, and Notre Dame, enjoyed a private bus tour and saw famous landmarks such as L'Arc de Triomphe and Les Champs-Elysées. We enjoyed a spectacular view and a nice visit to Sacré-Coeur church and had some guided walks in the Marais and Montmartre neighborhoods. As we are staying with host families, students continued to enjoy their host families' home cooking with bag lunches. We finished the day with a rainy but enjoyable trip down the Seine on a Bateau Mouche. ... read more

Henri Nomine is an interesting high school that is dissimilar to Dunwoody. For one, it's much older and consists of several buildings spread out between two different schools (general and technical). The French system is also different as far as number of years and degrees that are offered in high school. This specific school operates on a five day/week schedule where every day students have different classes between 8 AM -5 PM with frequent 15 minute breaks, an hour for lunch, and free periods in which students can come and go as they please or hang out in the foyer. Dunwoody students were given schedules and moved in groups observing and sometimes participating in the classes.... read more