New Blog for 2011-12

It's a new school year and we have a new blog : http://www.uadodge2011-12.blogspot.com/ 
 Please follow us!

UA Brazil Sciences Class 2011

Tomorrow we will depart Dallas with a group of 5 young UA scientists to Brazil. We invite you to follow our UA Brazil Sciences blog at http://www.uabrazilsciences2011.blogspot.com/ .....

GYLI's Living in a Flat World Global Conference, Costa Rica

Last weekend, we had the honor of presenting some of Ursuline's Experiential Learning opportunities at the GYLI (Global Youth Leadership Institute) "Living in a Flat World" conference in Costa Rica. It was a marvelous event which brought together global educators from all over the world. We were so happy to see many of our old friends who have visited us at Ursuline as well as to make new friends among the many distinguished attendees including the GYLI board members and the leadership of NAIS (National Association of Independent Schools).

In addition to sharing information about our Brazil Sciences class and our Cape Cod Sea Camp, we also presented information about how to prepare students for traveling to Africa. Of course, the setting on the campus of Earth University was perfect for our own experiential learning. GYLI made sure to give us special experiences including visiting a banana plantation, a dairy farm and a swine farm. As you might imagine, there were some unforeseen challenges (such as ant piles and lost luggage) but the many positive encounters (including one with a giant grasshopper and another with a tree sloth) made it all worthwhile.

A million thanks to our friends at GYLI for the invitation to beautiful Costa Rica!!

Summer Happenings...

We'd like to remind everyone that all sorts of wonderful things are happening over the summer .. We just welcomed back to Dallas our first-ever delegation to our sister school in Wimbledon, England. Today, students are participating in leadership conferences through GYLI (Global Youth Leadership Institute) in New Mexico and Costa Rica.

If you'd like to read more aboout the adventures of our Wimbledon delegation, please check out Ms. Alexander's blog at http://www.twoursulines.blogspot.com/

More summer updates coming soon! Please stay tuned....

Ursuline Global Conference in Brazil

Our third stop traveling through South America was an Ursuline Global Conference on "Fraternity and Life on the Planet." We were the very honored international guests at this fantastic meeting of Ursuline educators from all over Brazil. The conference was held at the very beautiful Ursuline school in Ribeirao Preto, Brazil, in the state of Sao Paulo. The conference participants were full of enthusiasm for Ursuline education, Saint Angela and global friendships. We also had the great joy of reuiting with many of our friends from our sister school in Bahia, Nossa Senhora da Piedade, who were also in attendance at the conference. The best news from the conference is that we at Ursuline Dallas have been asked to collaborate on an Ursuline Global Youth Conference to be held in Septemebr 2012 in Brazil. We hope that Ursuline students from all over the world will attend! More on this event will be coming soon! In the meantime, we treasure our wonderful experience in Ribeirao Preto and we look forward to gathering together with our students in 2012!!

Greetings from Chile

Greetings from Chile where Ms. Bourgeois and I (Ms. Nipp) have spent the weekend. We had a wonderful time at our sister school in Lima, Peru last week and now we are here in Santiago, Chile preparing to visit our Chilean sister school. Yesterday was really cold and rainy (it was 37 degrees - 70 degrees colder than Dallas!). However, today was clear and cold and crisp - and completely beautiful! The Andes, which surround Santiago, are snow-covered and have offered us spectacular views all day - what a magnificent surprise! Our dear friends from Colegio Santa Ursula, Andrea Raczinski and Soledad Villarreal, accompanied us today as we attended Mass at the Ursuline school and then toured a bit of the city. It was a grand day and we can't wait to visit our sister school as well as the Ursuline school in Maipu tomorrow!

Serving and Visiting Colegio Miramar

On our second full day in Peru, we visited the Ursuline School, Colegio San Jose, in the Miramar district of Lima (the school is generally known as Colegio Miramar). This school is in a very humble area of Lima so the Ursuline school provides not only a wonderful education for the children but also a sanctuary away from the difficulties of life outside the walls of the school. In fact, the sisters are very important to the life of the entire Miramar community as everyone knows them and is so grateful for the help and education that they provide. The children eat very well at school because the Sisters know that sometimes they lack food at home.
Our Ursuline students joined the girls from Colegio Santa Ursula in preparing snacks and lunch for the children and they also played with the youngest children on the play ground. It was a wonderful experience and the girls were excited to know that they will return to the Miramar school next week to help some of the older children with homework.

Summer Adventures Begin: Peru!

Well, exams and end-of-year celebrations are now over and the Summer adventures have begun! We currently have one group in Honduras and one group in Peru. I am posting some of the photos from our welcome to Colegio Santa Ursula in Lima where we arrived yesterday with 12 students. Today was a busy and intense day which included a welcome ceremony with the whole school, a school tour and a visit to an ancient Incan ceremonial center and burial ground which is literally around the corner from the Ursuline school. It's only been 24 hours and we already have lots of stories and adventures to share!!

Farewell to Africa

Our last day in Uganda was no less spectacular than all of the spectacular days that came before it. It was another beautiful day, warm with a cool breeze, and, after some reluctant packing and attending Mass, we set out for our last two adventures. The first was a lovely lunch at the Il Patio Italian Restaurant (and casino - but we didn't happen to visit that area!). We were honored to be joined for lunch by my personal favorite global couple, US Ambassador Jerry Lanier and his fashionable and festive wife, Catherine Kannenberg. The lunch was delicious and the conversation so lively. We chatted about everything from politics to Indian food to Royal Wedding fashion (still not over those hats!). After lunch (and the best molten chocolate dessert ever), we all agreed that we are very proud to have such charming and intelligent people representing the United States in Africa and how lucky we were to steal a moment of their time given their busy schedules. We hope that we'll have the opportunity to welcome our diplomatic friends to Ursuline in the near future when they return to the USA - it would be such a thrill for us and for our students!

So, after lunch, we wanted to see the children from EAC one last time. And again, we were overwhelmed by their warmth and generosity toward us. Not only were we the recipients of the best hugs ever but we were also treated to another fantastic performance - this time in honor of Michele who wasn't feeling well and missed the big welcome performance last week. The children, still on Easter vacation, were actually staying at another local school which is serving as a training center for them for the upcoming 2012 Spirit of Uganda tour. So, we were privileged to get a sneak peak into the 2012 tour (which YES, is coming to UA!)! The children showed us around the school and took us by the hand (so sweet) to see the dorms where they are living while they train. They told us that they were enjoying all of the space that they have and that they can't wait to visit us in Dallas. As you can imagine, the time to say goodbye came much too soon ...

It was not easy for us to leave Uganda. Bringing the trip full circle, some of the EAC children (organized by Agnes and Alexis, of course), surprised us and accompanied us to the airport to help with our mountains of luggage (including LOTS of beads and African drums) and to bid us farewell. More hugs and certainly some tears and we were on our way home! Despite an overly empowered KLM gate agent who rushed us onto the plane (one hour earlier than scheduled time, very strange), we left Uganda with only happy memories. The 24 hour travel time was brutal but so, so worth all that we gained from this life-evolving experience. We have arrived home safely and want to thank all of you who have followed our travel so closely. And to our dear friends in Africa, we have learned more from you than you can imagine, we felt your love and kindness every day and we can't wait to see you again!! Thank you!!

Cecilia, Michele, Maluza, Melanie, Rachel & Erin