Dignitaries, Ladies and Gentlemen, et bien sûr les enfants! C`est un

10th Anniversary Celebrations of the Roubaix Exchange
Speech by Edward Balfour, Headmaster of Northbourne Park School
at Roubaix Town Hall,
Wednesday 28th January 2015
Dignitaries, Ladies and Gentlemen, et bien sûr les enfants!
C’est un très grand plaisir d'accompagner notre dixième échange scolaire
entre NPS et le Collège Jeanne D'Arc ici à Roubaix. Les liens qui nous
unissent sont forts et nous apprécions beaucoup l’amitié qui existe entre nos
deux établissements scolaires. C’est une association qui va durer, j'espère,
encore au moins dix ans !
Je voudrais remercier, non seulement de ma part mais aussi de la part de
tous les élèves britanniques, Mme Tellier et tous les professeurs et les
familles à Jeanne D'Arc de leur accueil chaleureux.
The events of the last few weeks in Paris bring a particular poignancy to
our tenth year of exchange with the Jeanne D'Arc School, Roubaix. At
Northbourne Park, we proudly stand beside our French friends in
celebrating openness and tolerance between nationalities. It is for this
reason that our pupils decided earlier in January that they were happy to
declare that ‘Northbourne Park School est Charlie’.
Exchanges promote communication and learning. Our CM2 / Year 6
children will learn important lessons during their visits. Not only were our
pupils this morning surprised to be offered chocolatchaud for breakfast,
but learnt that in France, one drinks it out of a bowl! This is just one tiny
detail from the rich education that they will receive over the coming days.
Some lessons however are much more profound. Exchange is an exercise in
peace. On the exchange, pupils from both Roubaix and from Northbourne
Park learn to be interested in other languages, cultures and traditions. They
learn to extend the hand of friendship to others, who are not like them.
These children before us this evening will most likely live to be over 100
years old. They will need to be agile in adapting to a fast-moving, ever-
changing world. They will change jobs many times in their working lives
and they will work and live alongside people from many different cultures
and traditions across the world. Our exchange therefore is not just about
language learning or about tolerance and acceptance of other cultures and
traditions; we are teaching our young future citizens a celebration of
differences within our new global community. We are educating them to
open their eyes and see beyond linguistic and national borders and to
recognise their role as citizens of the world.
I firmly believe that those who recognise the opportunities and advantages
of celebrating our global community will succeed in the 21st century. This
exchange is the first step. Our exchange is the opposite of the events that
took place in Paris a few weeks ago, it creates, it celebrates and it
empowers.
Merci.