Students travel to Portugal, Gibraltar, Spain with OSP

This clever quip is the acknowledgement that what can be learned outside the classroom often has a greater impact in the development of a student than the course objectives studied in a classroom. The Overseas Study Program at Belen Jesuit has been inspired by that abuela’ssage advice for 22 years. OSP is committed to the cultural, political, spiritual, and personal growth of students and families by traveling to distant lands in the summer. Through the Jesuit paradigm of experience, reflection and action, the participants of OSP encounter insights into God’s good Earth and people from around the globe that are instrumental in the formation of Christians. Developing a sense of the world community is an established mission of the Society of Jesus. That goal is enhanced with each OSP trip. 

From June 14-24, the “classrooms” for OSP were Portugal, Gibraltar, and Spain. The 44 students, relatives, alumni, and teachers experienced breathtaking and blessed discoveries that are all found in books but now felt in person: basilicas, cathedrals, temples, mosques, palaces, castles, fortresses, ports, monasteries, museums, monuments, galleries, masterpieces, performances, stadiums, towers, bridges, fast trains, neighborhoods, restaurants, arsenals, and cemeteries. And then there is the magnanimous hospitality of Iberians.  

The social studies, theology, and humanities departments collaborated again in 2016 to create a customized itinerary with EF Tours, designed to benefit each student’s past and upcoming courses in school. Whether in a history, humanities, or religion class, students who get to travel are geometrically advantaged in relating to the subject matter. 

In a single day in Seville, for example, we prayed in the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the See, which began in 1401 to become the largest Gothic cathedral in the world; visited the tomb of Christopher Columbus; climbed the bell tower Giralda that inspired Miami’s Freedom Tower and Coral Gables’ Biltmore Hotel; marveled at Plaza de España, constructed for the Ibero-American Exposition of 1929, and recognized the setting for a Star War Episode II scene shot on location; witnessed the Moorish influence in Spanish architecture and gardening in our guided tour of the Real Alcazar; made a valiant effort at flamenco during a dance lesson; and then capped the evening at a professional flamenco dance show in El Palacio Andaluz. 

All that in Seville, and it was just one of 11 locations experienced along with Lisbon, Evora, the Rock of Gibraltar, Marbella, Malaga, Madrid, Toledo, El Escorial, the Valley of the Fallen, and Segovia!