“What they don’t learn in history books, that’s what we’re gonna share with them today”
On Sunday, March 15, students in Tigard High School’s Intercambio class spent an afternoon hearing about history from residents at Summerfield Senior Living in King City.
“What they don’t learn in history books, that’s what we’re gonna share with them today,” Summerfield Civic Association Vice President Carene Svoboda said about the exercise.
Summerfield residents spent a little over an hour recounting personal trials and tribulations that spanned as far back as the 1940’s and intermingled with historical events as significant as Watergate, Pearl Harbor and the Vietnam War. The exchange began in the 1940’s and covered each decade up into the 1980’s.
Tigard Rotary Club Member and Intercambio Teacher Kim Morris told Tigard Life that the event was partially spurred by current political initiatives involving education and wanting to let students interact with “living history.”
“We have living history right here,” Morris said.
According to the three students who met with seniors on Sunday, their Intercambio class centers around mentoring and giving advice to Tigard eighth graders before they become freshmen.
“It means exchange in Spanish,” Tigard Senior Rebecca Khosravani explained to residents. “The class was originally started, I believe, because it’s supposed to be an exchange of information…It’s supposed to just be like shared knowledge and you build a relationship.”
The afternoon activity was an exercise in sharing lived experiences with a younger generation, according to students, and by the end of the session, the highschoolers had plenty of accounts to pull from.
“We had chicken, a cow and a victory garden,” Svoboda said about her childhood in the 1940s. “When the war was over we had little flags and we ran up and down the street saying, ‘We won! We won!’”
Another Summerfield resident, Lona Olsen recounted her memories from growing up in Portland in the 1950s, remembering that during her childhood, “Portland was growing.”
“We would dance the sock hop, which was a silly little dance but everybody could do it,” Olsen said. “And then you would go to Yaw’s, because Yaw’s was the place to go.”
Other residents, like Scott Fischer, shared stories about the Vietnam War and the “real chaos” happening within the silent generation at the time.
“I got drafted in 69 and I had two or three friends who insisted that they take me to the border so that I could escape to Canada,” Fischer said. “There were big riots in downtown Portland State University.”
Students listened and asked questions about individual anecdotes and after the event, Khosravani reported that the activity was “extremely eye-opening.”
“This is not an experience that we’ve had normally and just being able to learn about their perspective was extremely eye-opening,” Khosravani said. “It was great hearing it from an actual human being.”
Morris said that he hoped to continue the program with future Intercambio students. Summerfield Civic Association members also told Tigard Life the event was a good first run, but hoped for a more inclusive conversation on the next go-round.
“This was the first time we had really done something like this,” Fischer said after the event. “I think we’re gonna learn from this in the future.”
