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Extranet Site
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SHINONOME PARTNERSHIP WITH
SHINONOME HIGH SCHOOL HIROSHIMA, JAPAN Teachers from Shinonome Junior High School in Hiroshima, Japan first visited Exploris in the spring of 2000. Since our initial encounter, Exploris Middle School has sent a delegation to Hiroshima each June, and our sister school, Shinonome Junior High School, has reciprocated each August. Throughout the years our delegations have grown, and since August 2003 the exchanges have included student representatives. Shinonome Junior High School is a lab school for Hiroshima University, much like we are connected to the Exploris museum and Imax. Our visits to Japan have included neighboring cities, and the Peace Park, which is a hauntingly beautiful park in Hiroshima. The Peace Park is dedicated to educating the world about the horrors of the atomic bomb, and the urgent need for peace across the globe. In Hiroshima's Peace Park, there is a memorial to the young girl, Sadako, a casualty of the bombing of Hiroshima. She made the folding of 1,000 cranes famous as a representation of peace and hope. In honor of our Shinonome friends, we presented one of the delegations with 1,000 origami cranes that our students took about six months to fold and string into a beautiful gift. When we exchange the students have home-stays, and the visiting teachers share lessons from Carl Sandburg poetry to formal Japanese teas. We go to sporting events, have dinner parties, we sing, we dance, and we laugh together. Since the summer of 2004 our students have begun to collaborate on projects related to global issues, including water quality and peace. Through our short annual exchanges, we are able to do what the Exploris mission inspires us to do; celebrate our similarities, respect and learn about our differences, and ultimately to make real connections with our sister school.
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