The community welcomed 12 new students and two teachers from Rockvilles longtime

sister city, Pinneberg, Germany, for an annual two week exchange program set up by the
Rockville Sister City Corporation (RSCC) this past Sunday, Sept 22.
As a program created to promote international friendships and strengthen the ties of the
two sister cities, whose relationship was established in 1957, the RSCC has been hosting German
students and teachers through exchange programs since 1986. The school has participated in this
particular program in years past, and is once again hosting students from the Gugs In Quellental
Elementary and Community School of the City Pinneberg until Sunday Oct 6.
Former teacher Susan Thorpe will still be included with the organization and leading of
the exchange program as she has for the past two years, though this year she will have several
teachers assisting her, including Michael Dickel, Kristen Daugherity and Noelle Gray.
Dickel, who traveled to Germany as a participant of a similar exchange program when he
was in high school, had the opportunity to discover firsthand the excitement of learning abroad.
Its going to be a lot of fun for everyone involved. You get to meet new people from a different
place. I am very much looking forward to it, Dickel said.
Each exchange student and teacher has been paired with one host family for the
duration of their stay, with some families taking in up to two students. The host family is
responsible for providing their guest with somewhere to sleep, meals, transportation to and from
school events and pre-planned weekend activities.
Im so excited to host a student because I think it will be a really cool exchange of
cultures, junior Anna Bartles-Newton said. She is just one of a handful of students who stepped
up to take in a student as an honorary family member for the duration of their stay.
The RSCC has worked with the school and the teacher coordinators to create a jam-
packed schedule for the visiting students filled with a mix of educational and cultural
experiences. On the evening of Sept 22, after the students arrived, there was a welcome reception
in the Media Center to get them acquainted with the program and the school. On the following
day, German students shadowed their hosts all day, learning the ropes of how American schools
work. On Tuesday, Sept 24, and Wednesday, Sept 25, they took a day excursion to Washington,
D.C., and took in the sights of the Nations Capital as tourists.
They then visited the outlet shops in Leesburg, VA to do some old fashioned American
shopping on Thursday, Sept 26. Today they will be hiking in Great Falls during the day and
attending the football game this evening. After a fun-filled weekend with their host families, they
will be heading up to New York City on Monday, Sept 30, and staying until Thursday, Oct 3.
Their final day in school will be next Friday, Oct 4, and there will be a farewell dinner planned
for them and their host families that night. Their time in America comes to an end on Sunday,
Oct 6, when they will board a plane and head back home to their families and friends in
Pinneburg.
It is really big and nice over here. Pinneberg is way smaller than Rockville and Im
really excited to be here. I havent seen much yet, but I really look forward to see D.C. and New
York. German exchange student Mick Feldtmann said.
Currently, the school is in the process of making a plan to do a reverse exchange where
students will be able to go to Pinneburg for two weeks and participate in programs similar to
what the German students do here in America. They hope to hold the exchange at either the end
of this year or beginning of next year. By experiencing the exchange process in reverse, students
will be fulfilling the RSCCs goal of mutual understanding in our world through cultural
sharing and dynamic friendships.