Tucker Brings Nicaraguan Group to Dartmouth

Hanover, NH, July 5, 2007   - The Tucker Foundation welcomes to Dartmouth six Nicaraguan college students, a professor, and a Nicaraguan adult advisor on July 11 through 23 from the University of the Autonomous Region of the Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua (URACCAN). For the past six years, Dartmouth has partnered with URACCAN through the Tucker Cross Cultural Education and Service Program (CCESP), which sends a 30-person team of Dartmouth students, faculty, and staff to rural Siuna, Nicaragua, every December for a service and educational program. At a community bonfire in Nicaragua during Dartmouth's December 2006 trip, URACCAN students asked why Dartmouth students could come to Nicaragua every year but URACCAN students were unable to visit the United States. The conversation inspired Dartmouth students and faculty to organize the exchange to bring a group from URACCAN to Dartmouth this summer.

While the Nicaraguan exchange participants will have time to swim in the river and play soccer on the Green, they will also be busy with academic programs, a community service project with COVER in White River Junction, and reflection on the exchange experience with Dartmouth students and staff. The students will also have the opportunity to visit Boston and meet with Tufts University students who have visited URACCAN in Siuna. The exchange is designed to support the mission of the Tucker Foundation by providing both URACCAN and Dartmouth students the learning opportunities to better prepare them to speak and act as ethical leaders and responsible citizens in a global community.

This exchange is lead by Douglas Moody, a lecturer in the departments of Spanish and Portuguese and Latin American, Latino and Caribbean Studies, and Benjamin Jastrzembski, Dartmouth class of 2008 , CCESP Student Director and 2004 graduate of Hanover High School. "This exchange pushes our commitment to cross-cultural learning to a new level by creating a truly bilateral exchange between Dartmouth and URACCAN," Jastrzembski said.

The exchange is sponsored by the Tucker Foundation, the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding, the Alan and Joan Bildner Endowment for Human and Inter-Group Relations, the Office of the Provost, Office of Residential Life, and Bridges to Community, an Ossining, NY based non-profit that facilitates Dartmouth's program in Siuna, Nicaragua.