St Mary’s College in Seymour has been treated to a visit by three teachers from West Kalimantan in Indonesia as part of a teaching exchange program.
Funded through the Asian Education Foundation, the teachers from the SMPN20 school in Singkawang flew back to Indonesia on Friday after an eventful visit.
St Mary’s Indonesian teacher Angela Molinaro was delighted with the exchange.
“It's very exciting for the staff and students,” she said.
“There's a lot of buzz around and it’s quite interesting.
“We've been teaching Indonesian here for about 11 years and this might be the first experience for staff and students to meet actual Indonesian people, which is great.”
Ms Molinaro said it was an opportunity for students to use their Bahasa Indonesia skills.
“I had the Year 9s introduce themselves in Monday's lesson,” she said.
“It's been important that they can speak the language and it really worked.
“You could see their eyes light up when they were speaking Indonesian and being understood, which was great.
“And when our guests are introducing themselves, the kids could understand as well. And even the little younger students ... they did a beautiful song for them today in Indonesian and I say it just makes the learning real.”
For visiting principal Hendra Kasim, it was his first trip to Australia.
He described Seymour as “luar biasa”, which means extraordinary.
Speaking through a translator, Mr Kasim said he was keen to “take some learnings” and share them with his school in Singkawang.
Visiting teacher Endra Muplihun was impressed with how technology was being used at St Mary’s. He said he had seen a lot of YouTube clips about technology and education in developed countries but he was excited to see it through his own eyes.
Mr Muplihun was particularly amazed at how the students used 3D printers.
It was teacher Eka Meiyanti's second visit to the school and she was excited to see how it had changed and grown.
St Mary’s principal Wayne Smith saw the visit as a great opportunity to encourage bilingualism among students and build international relationships.
“Australia has so many opportunities to connect to Indonesia and to those Asian countries,” he said.
"I think that we get an understanding of how lucky we are and that our near neighbours really are keen to improve education standards for their own children and their own students.
“And if we can play a part in that in any way, we will.”
Mr Smith hoped the visiting teachers would take “fond memories” of their time in Seymour back to Indonesia.