SISTER SCHOOLS PROJECT The Durham,UK Committee has several ongoing projects currently being organized. One is the Sister Schools Project linking Central Park School for Children and Gilesgate Primary School in Durham, UK. Brady Surles, one of the local committee members, has been communicating with the head master at Central Park School for Children, a charter school located in downtown Durham, NC, and has learned that curriculum planning for the project will begin in the spring of this year. The connection between students and staff at the two schools will begin in September and will involve electronic emails, internet links and webcam conferences focused on specific areas of study within the two schools. The principals of the two schools have conferred by email and are generating support among their respective faculties for this project. It is hoped that this project will generate some life-long links between children in the two schools.
NEIGHBORHOOD EXCHANGE
A second project is called the Neighborhood Exchange. This project is being designed to encourage local citizens from our two Sister Cities, not necessarily business or government leaders, to exchange visits in one anothers' homes and to experience the local culture of the area. The project will begin August 2-9 , 2010 with the arrival of four couples from the Witton-Gilbert village of Durham, UK. Four families here have volunteered to host the delegation, with a return visit being anticipated in the summer of either 2011 or 2012. The committee is planning visits and tours to local historical sites, beginning with Duke Homestead and concluding with the American Tobacco Historic District and Duke University; cultural sites, such as the Duke Nasher Museum and Museum of Life and Science, and social activities with host families and local community groups.
DURHAM READS EVENT In December several members of the Durham Committee participated in a joint project with the Downtown Rotary Club and Durham Library's "Durham Reads"; this involved a tele-conference held in Perkins Library at Duke University between local author, Paul Austin, members of the Rotary Club and medical community, and their counterparts from Durham, UK. There was a one-hour discussion of the author's recent book, "Something for the Pain", in which he relates his experiences as an emergency room doctor.
Please contact our committee to get involved with these and other exciting projects!
