Comenius school project at Guzeppi Despott Boys' JL

Guzeppi Despott Boys' Junior Lyceum kicked off on a good start last scholastic year as a group of enthusiastic students opted to participate in our competition for Best School Representatives. The theme of our project was "Fighting stereotypes in European nations". Students had to take part in a game involving information about the four participating countries as well as interview people who are actually combatting stereotypes.

Networking continued with the co-ordinators of our partner schools from Poland, Hungary and Germany. The date and destination of the third project meeting were finalised so the Maltese team, involving also Ann Gulic, Cultural Affairs, Marlene Gatt, Edmond Lufi and Rene Delceppo, met to finalise the last-minute details of the presentation for the Dessau meeting. We then continued working on the presentation with the seven students chosen to join us for the meeting.

The day of departure for Dessau finally arrived. Our students were hosted by German families. We had a chance to experience school life at the Sekundarschule Zoberberg Dessau and also attended various lessons. We discussed the German system of education with Mrs Pohl, head of school, and Comenius co-ordinators Annette Gallien and Illona Kay.

Each group of students representing the four partner schools were very eager to exchange viewpoints and experiences. The highlight of the trip was of course the school presentations. The German students focused on fashion as a means of uniting young people across the European borders.

The Polish emphasised through a series of interviews by one of the students acting as a TV journalist that it is great to get to know individuals from different countries. Their programme included also a number of songs.

The Hungarian co-ordinator, Klara Kuster, gave an overview of her group's participation for two years in the project explaining why they could not participate during the second year of the project.

The Maltese presentation included a board display, the "Verdala Story" - a Power Point presentation, an IT game by Form 4 student Norbert Bonnici, an investigative commentary by Form 4 students DesLuke Cini and Francesco Randich about whether women in Malta were still considered as the stereotyped housewives (this Track Gender Disparity project was launched by the Dutch Educational Institution Aliceo. The students' works can be viewed at www.aliceo.nl), a clip against racism by Noel Farrugia, a presentation featuring T-shirts designed by the Maltese Comenius team, a music and dance display by DesLuke Cini and Omar Borg about the importance of appreciating diversity, and a drama activity involving all Maltese students and others from partner schools.

Part of Shrek 2 was also dubbed in Maltese by the students. This film was chosen on purpose for it shows the importance of not judging people by their looks. The group sang a traditional song to close their programme.

The German co-ordinators also prepared a varied cultural programme for us, which included a tour round Dessau stopping at the famous Bauhaus where during the Twenties, masters of steel, leather and carpentry, besides training youngsters in these skills, worked in liaison with the industrial sector to create products which are so modern that one would think they were designed during this decade.

We then visited the Hugo Junkers museum and also went inside the JU52, designed by Professor Hugo Junkers. We also met the vice mayor of Dessau at the City Hall.

We all enjoyed the trip to Worlitz Park and Castle full of reproductions of famous paintings from across Europe and even far beyond. The visit to Leipzig Zoo was also a treat as we saw penguins, seals, all kinds of small and large fish, seahorses, sharks, giraffes, lions, iguanas, and elephants. During the stroll round the historical centre of Leipzig we also visited Bach's tombstone.

The third project meeting proved to be a great experience for us all, above all our students who understood the actual meaning of our theme. Saying goodbye to our friends was a problem. In fact everybody was sad at the train station when we had to leave for Berlin to return back to Malta. The great thing is that nowadays it's easy to communicate by text messages or e-mail and so our students kept us informed on what is continuously happening at our partner schools.

Back to our normal routine we kept getting visits from the chosen seven and together during break viewed each other's digital photos.

When Mrs Pohl and Mrs Gallien from our German partner school came on a study visit to our school we prepared a special presentation which truly impressed them.

This was not the end of the Comenius activities. Klara Kuster recently visited the school on a study visit. She experienced life at our school and also attended several lessons.

All these activities entailed a lot of effort by the members of the Maltese team and good backing from another teacher, Sonny Minuti. The Comenius section on our school Website has also been updated and can be viewed at www.schoolnet.gov.mt/gdespottjl thanks to our Webmaster, Godwin Borg.

However, the actual success of our Comenius project cannot be seen for it is above all entrenched in the spirits of all the students who have participated over the past three years.

Hopefully this project will help them face the challenges of today's modern world and be instrumental in creating a better world. In fact each of us can be the change we want to see in the world.