Odessa Freer is one of the youngest student ambassadors at New Families Orientation Day, 2024. Even though Odessa is a young rising 2nd grader, she is no stranger to Orientation Days: MIS is her third international school. Her first years of early childhood education were at international schools in Morocco, then Egypt, and now MIS. Many MIS students have a story similar to Odessa's. A large percentage of our students are “third-culture kids”, meaning children who are being raised outside of their parents' birth countries. Two common denominators among third-culture kids and students who spend most of their childhoods in international schools are frequently experiencing grief and feeling like they don’t quite “belong” anywhere.
If you ask Odessa where she is from, her answer is “Morocco” - even though her birth country is Turkey and her passport is American. This past summer, Odessa boarded a total of 7 different airplanes and visited friends and family in Turkey, USA, and Morocco. Even though she saw "Aladdin" on Broadway, ate a ton of ice cream at the Ice Cream Museum, and went to the top of the Empire State Building, she confides that the most meaningful experiences for her this summer were having a pool party with her two cousins in the USA and visiting her best friend Saad in Morocco. Odessa and Saad have been friends and schoolmates since they were 2-years-old. Their visits in Morocco “are special because we’ve been together for a long, long time, and when we moved away to Egypt, it broke my heart. I know it’s very hard to leave your country because when I left Saad after this visit, I cried all the way back to the hotel. When we visited their new house, I found my old stuffed tiger Raja. It was so big that we couldn’t take it on the airplane to Egypt. He was dusty, but Saad kept him for me.”
Being a third-culture kid who has experienced grief and struggles with belonging herself; in her 1st-grade year at MIS, Odessa noticed that many Junior School students join at any point during the school year. She wanted to make sure that those kids got the same kind of welcome that new students had at the beginning of the school year. To meet those needs, Odessa proposed the idea for the Junior School Welcome Squad to Junior School Principal, David Freed. In the proposal, Odessa outlined three research-based methods to provide a smooth transition for new students, no matter at what time of the school year they join:
1. MIS Swag (e.g. MIS-branded bracelets or shirts) – because looking like you belong can help you feel like you belong.
2. A Kid Tour – because kids have different interests than parents when they come to a new school. MIS Junior School students can provide a tour from a kid’s perspective.
3. Introductory Poster-Making – because sharing your story is essential to feeling like you belong.
That’s what Odessa and classmate Carla are doing today, on New Families Orientation Day, 2024. They are ambassadors helping new Junior School students create their Introductory Posters. These posters include a Polaroid snapshot glued to the poster, some fun facts, and personal story information about each student. Junior School Assistant Principal Tonianne Lederer plans to display the posters in the Junior School so existing MIS students can learn more about their new classmates.
New Families Orientation Day, 2024 is proof that many MIS students understand the importance of a good transition and feeling like you belong at a new school. Over 50 middle school students requested to be ambassadors on Orientation Day and over 30 Senior School students volunteered as ambassadors. MIS is honored to welcome 192 new students to our community this year. Our school year begins with a little over 1,300 students representing over 65 different nations. We wish each and every student an incredible school year; and for new students and families, we wish you a great start to your “M Story”.