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Schools

Lacey Township High School Plans Two Week-Long European Trip

School travelers to see the sights of France, Spain and Portugal over 13 days

Students and parents from Lacey Township High School will have the opportunity to experience the sights and sounds of three European countries at the conclusion of the current school year, from June 21 to July 3, 2012.

Next year’s educational thirteen-day tour of France, Spain and Portugal will include stops in Paris, Madrid, Toledo, Seville, Granada and Lisbon, and is the eighth annual trip of this kind to Europe taken by Lacey Township High School.

In Paris, those in attendance for the trip will get the chance to see many sights in the “City of Light”, including the Place Vendôme, Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame Cathedral, plus the world-renowned Louvre Museum – which is home to famous paintings such as Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa”, Caravaggio’s “The Fortune Teller”, and Jacque-Louis David’s “The Coronation of Napoleon”.

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From there, the traveling tourists will take an overnight train ride to Madrid, Spain, where they will be able to see the Palacio Real, built by Bourbon King Philip V, and the Museo del Prado (Prado Museum). Other sights to be seen along the way in Spain will be Segovia and El Escorial, Cordoba and Puerto Làpice, Seville, Costa del Sol and Granada.

The final stop on the trip will be the capitol city of Portugal, Lisbon. Visitors will see the Castelo de São Jorge, Torre de Belèm, and the Mosteiro de Jerònimos, which was built by King Manoel to memorialize the nation’s great explorers – including Vasco da Gama, who sailed from Portugal in 1497 and discovered a seafaring route to India.

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Although students will be visiting French and Spanish-speaking cities, the trip is open to all students regardless of what language they study.

As Lacey Township High School’s Spanish teacher Chuck Edens explained during a recent information session held at the school, the voyage is a custom trip, meaning they took the best elements of separate journeys to France and Spain/Portugal, and combined them into one trip.

“We want students to have a good, safe time. We also want parents to be comfortable in knowing that your son or daughter will have a safe, educational time on this trip,” Mr. Edens said.

Fellow trip coordinator and Lacey Township High School English teacher Shaun Banin commented that those who have visited these countries before, Portugal in particular, have raved about the sights in that country.

A disclaimer which accompanied information booklets on the trip stated that the European tour was not “sponsored, organized or endorsed” by the Lacey Township Board of Education, but that the board was permitting the school to offer the trip to students and other prospective participants. “The decision whether this trip offers an appropriate and safe educational experience is made exclusively by you as the parent/guardian,” the disclaimer read.

The trip will be run by the Education First (EF) Educational Tour company. EF is the world’s largest private educational organization with 45 years experience. The organization has offices and schools located in over 50 countries and offers language, travel and cultural exchange programs for students of all ages.

“Everyone has been pleased over the years with how we’ve conducted the trip,” Mr. Edens said.

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