School

How important is school during exchange? I was brought up on the notion that school is a priviledge and it is always important to do well in school.

During my year in Muskegon I was bored beyond belief. Being a senior in high school in the states is just not the same level as being a student in second year in a danish high school. Very quickly I realized just how little I had to do and still maintain a GPA over 3.5. I didn't have much trouble with the language nor the academic level that was taught so I could pretty much slack off in most classes. The only two classes where I couldn't slack was my hostmothers class (British lit) and Calculus. My hostmother knew that I could do better and required that I did as much as possible and calculus was actually at the same level as at home (and I would be able to use it at home).

By not even trying too hard I still managed to land in the top 10 in my class.

The story for my student is however very different. Not only is almost everything done in a different language but the level is also college level for her and she needs the credits to able to skip junior year at home and still graduate with her classmates at home.

Another thing she has to learn is that school is different than in the states (I know stating the obvious). But here we learn and understand but there they memorize and forget ... well somethings sticks ...

We were talking about the American election the other day and she was baffled about how much we care about who ends up in the whitehouse. And she was aslo baffled about how much everybody here knows about politics. That reminded me of the standard answer to my questions about different issues in Muskegon; "I don't know - we haven't covered that in school yet."

I remember my second year in the danish highschool - it was tough! And I did a lot of homework. She says she does her homework and the only class she has real troubles in is in physics but I don't see her studying that much ... and does it matter if she doesn't?