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Shaker’s German Exchange Program Celebrates 20 Years with Anniversary Brunch Oct. 10 SHAKER HEIGHTS, Ohio, August 16, 1999 – In 20 years of exchanges, Shaker Heights High School has sent almost 700 students to Goslar, Germany and hosted more than 500 Germans here. Former trip participants, teachers and host families have decided to celebrate the 20-year milestone with a birthday bash on Shaker’s Homecoming Weekend, Oct. 10. “The Goslar exchange, like our other foreign exchange programs, has fostered not only personal friendships but also cross-cultural understanding. It has helped both the students who traveled, and those who met and hosted exchange students at home, to gain a wider view of the world,” said Superintendent of Schools Mark Freeman. “It’s wonderful to have this opportunity to celebrate it.” Retired German teacher Lynda Mayer and a committee of former host parents, former student-travelers and German teachers, have organized a 20-Year Goslar Reunion Brunch to coincide with both Homecoming Weekend and the visit of the next group of Goslar students this fall. The brunch – which follows a year of planning and exhaustive efforts to contact former Goslar travelers – will cost $25 per person but will be free to visiting Goslarians, Mayer said. Proceeds from the brunch will go to a fund to help an under-financed Shaker student pay for the trip to Goslar. The trip now costs approximately $1,600 per student, according to Shaker German teacher Mary Ashcraft. That covers airfare, a German rail pass and stays in youth hostels for the week the students spend touring the country. Apart from those side trips, students stay with host families in Goslar, she said. “The homestays help keep the cost down and they provide opportunities for students to really make connections with people.” The first Shaker contingent to visit Goslar left in 1979. Every year since then, groups of about 10 Shaker students have visited the small, medieval city in the Harz Mountains for about four weeks at the beginning of Shaker’s summer vacation. Goslar students are still in school at the time, so the Shaker students attend classes at its local secondary school, Ratsgymnasium Goslar. In addition, Ashcraft said, an average of six Shaker students per year spend an entire semester at Ratsgymnasium. The school’s German-language website is at www.pe.tu-clausthal.de. Shaker student Emily Stear, 17, recently returned from her semester in Goslar. She said she loved her schoolmates and host family and she stayed too busy to get homesick. “I probably gained more self-assurance,” she said. Emily’s older brothers, Jeffrey ’92 and Kevin ’94, also went to Goslar as exchange students when they were at Shaker. Their mother, Karen Stear, said “It’s a great opportunity. They’ve had to be independent and self-sustaining but, from a parent’s perspective, it was all in a safe environment, because they were living with another family.” In 1998, Shaker got a jump on the 20-year celebration when it sent 250 student musicians to Goslar for spring break. It was the first time Shaker’s marching band, orchestra and A Cappella Choir all traveled together. The band performed for thousands in Goslar’s village square as well as on side trips to Bonn, Cologne, Celle and elsewhere. This year’s reunion will be tinged with sadness, however, as the Shaker community marks the passing of a great supporter of the German exchange, former Shaker principal A. Jack Rumbaugh, who died in June. Rumbaugh accompanied Shaker students to Goslar five times, most recently on their 1998 trip . The Goslar Reunion Brunch is set for Sunday, Oct. 10 at 11:00 a.m. at the Cleveland Athletic Club. Tickets, at $25 per person, are available by contacting Lynda Mayer at (216) 921-6804.
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