Our School

Last week, after so many months of preparation and anticipation, our 8th grade class headed out on their four-week capstone Global Studies trip—and for the first time since 2019, they're traveling internationally, to Vietnam! We wish them an inspiring and thought-provoking trip.

Before departing, 8th graders and their families attended a farewell ceremony, an Evergreen tradition. Both adults and students considered new responsibilities upon return, and parents offered their students a small gift to carry with them on their trip, symbolic of their wishes for their child ... on this trip and into the future, as they develop new independence. Plus, some of these parents and trip chaperones are Evergreen and Global Studies Trip alums themselves!

Global Studies Program: Throughline to a Capstone Experience
At Evergreen, our Global Studies Program is part of the curriculum from preschool on. Over their years here, students learn about different skin colors, about differently abled people, about identity and gender diversity, and so much more. Then, in 8th grade, trip preparations ramp up, as students focus specifically on the country they'll visit. This year, they studied the history, culture, and economic and political situation of Vietnam, and added an after-school Vietnamese language class as well. By the time they leave Seattle, the 8th graders have a lot of information about Vietnam.
But what students learn over the course of their month-long stay adds up to so much more. 

In Vietnam, they'll meet other students their age; they'll talk with them, laugh with them, maybe play a game together. They'll contribute to a building project together with Vietnamese NGOs and meet some of the people who will benefit from it. They'll visit important cultural sites, and think about the people who live there now and also in centuries past. In the process, our students will deeply reconsider their ideas about what is "normal"—normal in terms of clothing, housing, daily activities, breakfast foods. This kind of growth brings the global experience down to a human level: you and me. 

Self-Knowledge
In addition, our 8th grade class will learn a lot about each other and also themselves. In Peru, they will spend a lot of time together. They'll get to know their peers—with whom they've already spent years, many of them, working and studying and playing together—in entirely new ways. They'll forge new connections, they'll learn how they handle themselves in circumstances very different from an average school day.

While they learn intimately about a very different part of the world, they'll also learn about themselves: what they bring to the world, and how they move through it and interact. And they'll do it all together, as a whole class, experiencing the same things but processing them differently. It's a wonderful and meaningful way to wrap up their Evergreen experience.