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What was your inspiration to begin Global Perspectives?

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The program predates Cuba. Part of it was based on education; I was working on the concept of integration so that students could see the interconnections between different subject areas. Education was getting more myopic, many were only interested in math and science and I felt they needed to see how things connected in the world - that was the academic side. On the creative side, I was getting bored. I’d been teaching a long time and I needed a new challenge. And then we started to look at the idea of globalization just as it was coming out.

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How has the program become what is today?

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So the program actually existed without travel initially for a couple years as a field test. Then we were pulled for a year in 1998 and brought it back 1999/2000 with a number of new subjects and with the travel to Germany. We did the exchange with the Germans starting then. That was made possible because I was on council. I was an elected member of council from 1988 to 2003. We had a sister city relationship to a city in Germany. I’m on the international relations council representing council and so it was a natural match. I combined my teaching knowledge with my council knowledge in order to marry the two opportunities. That gave birth to global. A couple of years later, the Germans couldn’t do one of the years for whatever reason and I needed another option, so a friend of mine told me about the program in Cuba. It was at the university of Matanzas run by a  gentleman Geraldo Diaz Perez (whose grave this year, as well as previous years, we went to). I talked to my principal and board of education at the time, and they said: "Go, take some PD money and find some friends to cover classes. So I came down and spent a week in the area and at the university meeting Geraldo as well. When I came back we made the decision to talk to the parents. Travelling to Cuba was actually much harder than what it is currently; people had to carry buckets to fill toilets, water ran an hour in the morning and an hour at night and you had to go to a central spigot in the university square. It was much more complicated than what the conditions currently are. If you think the food is bad now, you’ve never seen Cuban university food in the early 2000s. It was a huge challenge, but, everybody loved it, and so from there it's been growing.

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What do you believe is the most noticeable/best outcome for students and teachers participating in Global Perspectives?

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I think the two most special things about it are: 1) the number of students who stayed in touch over the years, for whom this program, Global, and this place, Cuba, have been real turning points in their lives on a major level. A lot of it is interpersonal, a lot of it is sensitivity, a lot of it is interpersonal connections, a lot of it is also career based. A person who was going to be a doctor is always going to be a doctor, but now I've got 3 or 4 being doctors without borders. I've got engineers, I've got pilots flying UN peace missions or humanitarian aid missions. I think people always are going to do what they were going to do but with a international, humanitarian touch to it. And 2) is that I believe the next generation of teachers and administrators are able to benefit from a pathway we created long ago, I mean the current administration even know who I am and I've been retired for many years now. So, it must be an important program. The fact that the program continues after 5 years since my retirement, is a testament to their (our current admin and current coordinator and teacher's) commitment because it's just unheard of in education really.
 

What advice do you have for future Global generations?

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I guess it's as simple as be kind and care about others. There's enough people in the world who to idiotic things, there's enough violence, there’s enough hatred. I think people should go big or go home; I think you should play hard, I think you should love large, I think you should live large, I think you should care intensely, I think tears are fine because their honest emotional moments. I think people should squeeze every ounce of life out of the thing we call life, and live every moment. As an aside to that, on a more academic level, when I was always coaching football I would always say in the dressing room, “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard” so the idea is to work hard.