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Spanish High School Students Visit Indy as Part of Exchange Initiated by Education Professor

INDIANAPOLIS - Four public high school students and a teacher from Granada, Spain visited Indianapolis last week as part of an ongoing cultural exchange, initiated by School of Education Professor José Rosario, between their school and local Arsenal Technical and Northwest high schools .

The exchange was part of an initiative to keep local Hispanic students in school through leadership development, community service, and otherwise unavailable opportunities such as overseas exchanges.

Over the past several years, Rosario has worked to keep Hispanic students at the two local schools from dropping out by developing and encouraging their participation in "Clubs Latinos." Members participate in videoconferences with the Granada students and develop community service projects. The initiative has now grown into a much larger project called El Puente, meaning "the bridge," which is a partnership between the IUPUI Center for Urban and Multicultural Education (CUME), of which Rosario is director, and the Hispanic Education Center, which has served the Hispanic community in Indianapolis since 1988.

El Puente is a three-year project that will target Hispanic students and their parents at the two IPS high schools and three feeder middle schools to encourage and support the youth in finishing high school and continuing with post-secondary education.

Officials at the high schools have been planning student exchanges for the past year. The groups hope to eventually host more students in longer and larger exchanges.

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