For the second year in a row, Lydiksen Elementary last week hosted students and teachers from Liuxia Primary School in Hangzhou, China.
Fourteen children, three teachers and a translator made the trek to Pleasanton, arriving in the Bay Area on Oct. 3.
Their visit is part of a “sister school” relationship that blossomed in spring 2016, when vice principal Janet Gates (now principal of Donlon Elementary) traveled to China to tour Hangzhou and visit Liuxia.
Then last October, Liuxia students and staff traveled to California, spending two days at Lydiksen amid sightseeing excursions in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
This year’s visit followed a similar itinerary, as the group spent Oct. 4 and 5 at Lydiksen after taking in the sights around San Francisco on Oct. 3.
“A lot of our students speak Mandarin, so it’s a great way for them to share who they are in a different way than they normally would,” Lydiksen principal Jacob Berg said.
As part of the sister school visit, older Lydiksen students who speak Chinese served as “ambassadors,” showing the guests around and helping with translation.
During the two-day visit, students did calligraphy, took part in a special assembly and made presentations comparing and contrasting their schools.
Liuxia sixth-graders Elsa Jiao, Andy Yin and Penny Wei said they were happy to be in Pleasanton.
With Lydiksen fifth-grader Sophie Tsai translating, Jiao said she especially liked Lydiksen’s classrooms, Yin enjoyed the playground and basketball courts and Wei said she appreciated that “this school is quiet. Our school has a lot of noise.”
Liuxia teacher Huide Shi also had a positive experience at Lydiksen.
“The students in this school are happy and energetic,” he said with a fellow teacher translating. “I think the teachers in this school have done a great job.”
Berg said he hopes other Pleasanton schools could form sister school relationships.
“For our student population to have this interaction with students from another country is such a great thing for our students,” he said.
