Building the Marist Global Network
The Maristak Durango school (Province of Ibérica) has received for the second consecutive year the visit of several directors and specialists from the schools Hermano Fernando, Nuestra Sra. de Andacollo, Marcelino Champagnat and Diego Echeverría, all of them Marist schools in Chile with technical education.
The idea of the Global Network of Marist Schools to build a “collaborative network that connects and encourages Marist schools to walk together” has made it possible to connect these four centers in Chile with a center in Bizkaia in order to share experiences and good practices. 13 people, including managers and teachers, traveled from Chile to Durango (Bizkaia) to learn about good practices in the field of active-collaborative methodologies based on challenges, of which the Maristak Durango center is a reference.
From September 25 to 29, the delegation from the four centers experienced first-hand the teaching experience by living with the teachers in the classrooms. Each person from Chile was accompanied by a person from the Durango center, which favored the exchange of knowledge and enriching experiences.
Several visits were also organized. Of particular note was the trip to Donosti to visit the Tknika Innovation Center for Vocational Training, a center under the Basque Government, where, welcomed by its director Jon Labaka, they were able to experience first-hand the technological and educational trends in vocational training in the Basque Country. On the other hand, they also had the opportunity to visit another private center with VET in the Biscayan capital, Salesianos Deusto. And, of course, they enjoyed, on a tourist level, the cities of Bilbao and Donosti.
On Friday, at the farewell, there were words of emotion from the Chilean teachers. Hostaizka Sainz, from the Durango management team (who was with the whole delegation), says that they were moved when they heard the first testimony when she said:
“I want to thank you for the great welcome and for the openness of the teachers, we were able to experience teachers who were present, with family spirit, close to the students, humble, involved in the service of education and smiling. And although it could be that they were good actors, nothing could have been further from the truth, because when we asked the students, they confirmed it”.
“We have experienced the climate of the Challenge from several angles, not only in the students, but also in each teacher, in the management, organization, structure… All as a team and forward, even knowing that there could be difficulties. A center that integrates projects and innovates with companies so that the teaching staff is up to date and can provide students with all the technical aspects that companies need. It is a bridge that we have created and that we want to continue to build, including student exchanges,” said another teacher from Chile.
These types of meetings are part of the Global Champagnat Network, and they help us to determine that we are not islands, that establishing collaborations and connections between us always adds up, because beyond exchanging knowledge, innovation or professional development, it enriches us to know other parallel realities; which, in essence, are the same, that is to say, the Marist Essence.
To learn about exchange experiences between Marist schools, we invite you to the internationalization session that will take place on October 17 during Champagnat Global Week.