Partner Schools Share Culture of the Americas through “Murga”- Participant Stories - Educational Seminars Dario Benitez, the principal of a secondary school in La France, Argentina recently spent three weeks in New Haven, Connecticut with Alicia Caraballo, principal of the New Haven Adult Education Campus for students age 16 and up as part of the Educational Seminars Exchange Program.  Caraballo and Benitez both work with students who, he explains, “live in situations of vulnerability and emotional and material deprivation, which can lead to the expression of pain through aggression.”

During Benitez’s exchange in the U.S., he and Caraballo found common ground and were inspired to build their school partnership through a culture-sharing project called the ‘School Murga’ to help students with more positive forms of expression.”

According to Benitez, Murga is theater and art, “the voice of those who do not want silence - memory and commitment infected with joy and hope.” The School Murga project, he says, “uses history, geography, music and theater as a form of reflection and artistic expression to share culture and the Argentinean ‘reality’ with the U.S. students.”

With their teachers, the students of IPEM Nº 8 are creating music, dance, scripts, letters and stories to represent how their culture developed and how they live.  According to Benitez, the project “has generated much desire of youth and even of school alumni to participate, sing, dance and learn about Murga.”

After viewing the Argentine student’s Murga, the American students will reflect on their own reality and create a Murga to share in return. Benitez reflects on the goals of the project saying, “I think my students will see another side of the United States and their young citizens, not only the success that you can see in the movies. It will be helpful for them to see that in the U.S. you also have students like them.” The students in Argentina and the U.S. are currently sharing their experience through a blog and on a facebook page that highlights “common issues faced by young people both in American society and in Argentina”.

In addition to their online contributions, the IPEM Nº 8 students will present their Murga to their community, and to U.S. principal Alicia Caraballo, when she travels to Mr. Benitez’ school in June to complete her Educational Seminars exchange.  Through Murga, Benitez says, “young people in Argentina and the U.S. have found a creative, intelligent and non-violent way to make other people hear them.”