Forty-seven ninth-graders from Columbus International High School will study local food production at Olney Friends School on April 8.
The visitors will join their counterparts, ninth-grade Olney Friends School students, for a hands-on tour of the farm and the school's 350-acre campus. They will eat lunch with Olney students; locally grown foods are on the menu.
In all, the ninth-graders from Columbus will learn as much as possible about local food and how it is produced at Olney.
New in the Columbus City School system, the International High School opened its doors this year to ninth-grade students.
It will add one grade level annually for the next three years. Many of the students in the program come from language-immersion programs at the middle-school level in French or Spanish. The school offers classroom instruction in both languages, as well as classes to learn Chinese.
The student body at both schools is quite diverse. Students at Olney Friends School come from 10 states and 12 countries. About a quarter are from Ohio. Students at Columbus International High School come from more than 20 countries, speaking more than 15 home languages.
The school draws from Columbus in general; and the student body includes many second-generation Americans.
Each grade in Columbus International is divided into four "houses." Each house researches a topic in depth for an entire year, such as social justice, human trafficking, hip-hop, or - in the case of the group visiting Olney - globalization. Each topic is further honed - in this case, to fast food as a prime instance of globalization.
Why visit Olney?
Amanda Comstock, program coordinator for the International High School, said, "We want students to have a hands-on experience to inform their research. We found out you guys have a wonderful farm at your school. You eat from the farm. You have this other experience - what agriculture can look like on a completely local level."
"We are pleased to host our guests from Columbus International High School," said Olney's assistant head of school Mary Ellen Newport. "The two high schools share a common goal of educating young people to make thoughtful choices about their actions in the world."
Olney Friends School, a boarding and day high school in Barnesville, brings students from around the state, around the country, and around the world to study in a college preparatory program in grades 9-12. The academic program focuses on humanities, the arts and the sciences.
