Monday, April 20, 2015

China Exchange 2015 - At Our Sister School in Nanjing

The second part of our journey took place in Nanjing, where our students stay with a host family and experience regular life in China. They follow their host student as they go through their normal routine at Nanjing Foreign Language School. At the school. they take a variety of courses on traditional Chinese arts.

The main classroom building of the Nanjing Foreign Language School

Our students giving a presentation and hosting a Q&A session in a middle school English class.

The art of Chinese papercutting


China Exchange 2015 - A Week of Sightseeing

THE GREAT WALL (Beijing)







TIANANMEN SQUARE (Beijing)






SUN YATSEN'S TOMB (Nanjing)


WEST LAKE (Hangzhou) 




Wednesday, February 4, 2015



That's our 2014 Cohort promoting a Project Bronx fundraiser for our program! Fact is, this program would not be possible without the generosity of the community. If, like us, you believe that cross-cultural communication is valuable to building perspective and character, and that our students deserve the same kind of access to these opportunities that schools with greater resources can provide, please help us keep this program alive!

Once upon a time, we had a New Visions grant to begin this program. Our first two cohorts of students paid nothing to go to China. Alas, our program is no longer "new" and has not qualified for such a grant in a while, and the burden of the cost of this trip has largely shifted onto the students themselves. Our students are now responsible for contributing $2000 to the overall cost of the trip--the rest of the money the school tries to raise via donations from our local supporters, more grant-writing, and of course, the year-long fundraising efforts of our own China Exchange students.

Check out this year's 2015 Cohort of students who are trying to raise funds to make it to China, and find out what their story is! Some of them have been working and saving for over a year, and all of them are working as a team to plan and host school events as well as small-scale bake sales and the like to raise funds for the whole group.

Where does your money go? 
The two-week trip costs between $2500 - $3000 per person. This covers the plane ticket to China, domestic travel within China (one train and one domestic flight), hotel and food for one week (for the other week our students live with a Chinese student as part of a homestay experience), all the touring and sightseeing costs, and visas. New York City requires three chaperones for international travel--that's another significant cost incurred. Our students must contribute $2000 towards these general costs. Anything you donate via this page will be divided equally amongst the students to defray the cost of this personal $2000 contribution. 






THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR DONATION! <3 <3
If you require a tax exempt form, please email Ms. McMurdo at kmcmurdo@marblehillschool.org

Friday, January 2, 2015

China Exchange Game Night Dec 2014


Great Game Night this past December! We had a big turnout, including some alums! 

This year's group brought tons of videos games and some new ideas to the table--a treasure hunt that had a few girls running around grabbing stars off the walls like crazy at about 7:30. our other clubs pulled through with some awesome games, as well. Big thanks to Comic Club who hosted 30-sec drawing competitions; Health Club, who organized push-up competitions and hackey sack; Model UN for coordinated Pie-A-Teacher (and several students!); and of course our Mr. Barreto for running the limbo competition. 

 Pushup competition!
 Saira in the ladies finals of limbo!
 Mr. Levine getting ready to be pied.
Kenny getting even readier.