French exchange students Arthur Grandjean and Claire Merandi, who visited and took classes at Rockdale Career Academy for a week and were hosted by local families and teachers, presented the monthly "Inspiration" presentation to the Board of Education on Feb. 16. - Transcribed by Pat McGuire

Arthur Grandjean: Good evening I am going to read you a French quote of a very famous and popular writer, Charles Baudelaire. We both choose this quote because we think that teachers are artists in education.

"Un artiste n'est un artiste que grâce à son sens exquis du beau, - sens qui lui procure des jouissances enivrantes, mais qui en même temps implique, enferme un sens également exquis de toute difformité et de toute disproportion."

Claire Merandi: The translation is "an artist is an artist only because of his exquisite sense of beauty - a sense which shows him intoxicating pleasures but which, at the same time, implies and contains an equally exquisite sense of all deformities and all disproportion."

So, now I will speak about [Rockdale Career Academy]. I was really impressed about the Talent Show that the students did because there was a lot of talented students.

I didn't know that in America you trust in artistic things.

In RCA, I went in fashion marketing class and culinary arts which increased the creativity and opened the mind of the student. In more, all the teachers did their job with their heart and passion and it is a really good thing.

Grandjean: And for me, I will speak to you about science in RCA because I like science. There are different subjects we don't have in France like architecture and manufacturing. This is very different from France.

I think architecture is very good for a student because it is really a concrete subject and it is a great opportunity for a student to start in high school what they want to learn after. So, I think architecture is very, is an example of art in the world and this goes for a student who will learn it now.

So, to conclude, I just want to say that good teachers are artists, no matter what language they speak.

Question from board member Jean Yontz: What's the difference between France education and American education that you see (here)?

Merandi: I think that the teachers here do their job with their heart and their passion. And they are like, and they do that with... I don't know how to really explain that but they trust in what they are learning, or teaching to their students so I can see that the student like (to) learn because of that.

Grandjean: I think that in my high schools there are only traditional subjects like math, physics, and maybe most of the students are bored by these subjects and here in RCA there are really concrete subjects and I think students are more interested in these subjects than the traditional subjects.