U.B. Sahrawi is a formally constituted business in Norway, as part of the Ungt Entreprenørskap scheme, as well as being an EAC in the College. The goal of U.B. Sahrawi is to import artefacts from the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria and market them in Norway and Scandinavia. An associated goal is to help establish production of these artefacts in the camps, preferably involving young people in this production. We need people who either know or want to learn about business, import-export, marketing and production.
Feb 022008
Feb 022008
During January’s Project Based Learning week the first years of our college went through a three-day-long simulation of the United Nations. They were accompanied by 30 guests from two schools in Bergen (Sotra and Åsane) and from the UWC located in Wales, United World College of the Atlantic. Likewise, a few of our first years had this same experience as exchange students at the Welsh UWC.
All participants had a designated delegation and committee. Each committee dealt with a current issue of international importance, from among the following topics: the FARC situation in Colombia, the dictatorship in Belarus, capital punishment, child labor, illegal logging of Amazonian timber, the influx of Burmese refugees into neighboring countries and assessment of the UN’s resettlement policy.
The delegates had a chance to experience engaging formal discussions, draft resolutions, defend their designated countries’ interests, negotiate and compromise. Our students got to witness diplomacy in action, address some of the world’s most burning issues and in most cases even arrive at a solution to these 
same problems. Doubtlessly, this glance at the decision-making process of the UN through a professional role-play was valuable for the participants.
Just like professional diplomats, the delegates were expected to dress formally, obey the rules of formal discussion, present their countries’ arguments and answer challenging questions posed by the 
media. They faced a challenging and intense schedule including preparation, research and resolution-writing.
Nevertheless, our hard-working delegates did not forget to have a lot of fun during their meals, at the cocktail party and even at the General Assembly, where they were seen to pass notes with very diplomatically phrased jokes.
Towards the end of the MUN process the delegations gathered in the General Assembly and voted on the products of their hard work: the resolutions. In the closing ceremony the chairs of each committee awarded the best delegate and the best proposal of their committee with a certificate.
The event was organized by a group of second years which constituted chairs and presidents of the committees and the General Assembly, the media crew which provided the event with full media coverage and the administrative and security staff.
Offered as a kind of intense, immersive experience into the Spanish Language and Cultures, this PBL took place during the last five days of January. Five students of Spanish ab initio took part in it.
We started every morning by preparing and then having breakfast together, all the while chatting in Spanish. After that, we would watch a movie in Spanish and discuss it afterwards — also in Spanish. Among the films we watched were: Todo sobre mi madre (Spain, 1999), Spanglish (USA 2004, dubbed fully into Spanish), and María llena de gracia (USA-Colombia, 2004).
On Wednesday we decided to cook a whole meal. In order to do this, we researched Hispanic recipes on the internet (only pages in Spanish), discussed them, and finally settled for empanadas as our main dish. We made a list of ingredients and went shopping, all the time practicing our language skills.
The following day we focused on music. We brought songs and pieces we liked and presented them to the rest of the group. We listened to what everyone had contributed and made presentations to each other about our favorite artists and their music. Many requests of copying and borrowing had flown back and forth by the time the day came to an end and, with that, our week was over.
Participants report they enjoyed all activities and thought it all was excellent practice, particularly now that their orals are coming up!
Feb 022008
The Chinese PBL started on Monday, with us as the three participants: Haoran, Ira and Ishiaka. On the first day we had dumplings for brunch. We learned how to make them and the difficult part was to make a perfect dumpling shape, but in the end we all managed. Afterwards, we were taught by Haixia and Guli how to write our names in Chinese. Then, on the second day, we cooked rice and tofu (made from corn) and 5 different dishes to eat with the rice.
During this process we learned a little more about Chinese culture and how several dishes are served for just one meal. It was different from our cultures, since we are used to having meals with just a few dishes. For example, during a marriage ceremony they have hundreds of different dishes.
After this dinner, we were so full that we couldn’t eat until the next day. On Wednesday, we cooked dinner again, but this time we learned how to make noodles from scratch. First we had to make long chains and then we had to fold them and hit them on the table to make them longer.
After we had our noodles, we went to watch a Mongolian movie called “Tuya’s marriage”.
Thursday was the last day of this PBL. We made small dumplings and ate them with soup. Haoran made his special soup with just 2 eggs and sea weed.
We had a lot of fun making the dumplings and eating them. We were telling jokes about how the dumplings looked like, and Haoran and Ishiaka were having a spice competition (who would eat the most spiced food). After this, we finalized our PBL by learning how to write our Chinese names with a brush.
This PBL was one of the best PBL’s we’ve had and we feel like we’ve learned more about this amazing culture!!!
Feb 022008
The Ski-snøhul PBL lived up to its reputation yet again: snow, adventure, cold feet and memorable moments. Four Africans and an Uzbek, some itching with anticipation, others pensive with incomprehension: Fanele, Kopano, Mustapha and Akmal set off to conquer (survive?) the Norwegian cold last Tuesday under Alistair’s watchful eye. It was a smooth, uneventful drive to Breimsbygda.
After a two-hour steep uphill hike on skins we found the perfect spot to build a snow cave, our humble abode for the next few days. The otherwise unpredictable weather was on our side as we dug and shovelled snow for the next three hours. Combining Alistair’s need for being ‘organised’ and our excitement as the cave slowly unravelled, excavations were done quickly and efficiently, just in time for the light to disappear into the first night and we were asleep by 7:30pm.
The next morning, all were in high spirits for finally getting down to the whole point of this semi-holiday: skiing. Following a simple breakfast of porridge, hoping against hope that the weather would stay on our side, we put on our skis and went out exploring. The combination of snow and sun is heavenly; the dramatic Norwegian mountains melting into sweeping valleys added to the wonderment of our surroundings.
Soon, as nature would have it in these parts, a herd of reindeer joined our small party. I guess they were as curious about us as we were about them! Or maybe they felt we were encroaching on their territory? As the guilty tourists that we were, we took pictures of the reindeers and with them (in the background of course). Encouraged by this, we decided to head out more into the mountains, the weather being in agreement for the time being, and skied up a medium hill which Alistair promised would be ‘simply glorious’ to sweep down on skis (like a bird I presume). Everything went well until halfway up the hill when our ally the weather betrayed us. Seeing no more than ten metres ahead, and fears perpetrated by getting lost and not finding our humble yet much-appreciated abode, we cut our adventure short and made our way back through the mists. Verily, it was a landscape of no boundaries!
The day was saved by our West Saharan member who soothed our chilled spirits with a Guinness Record Book activity: purveyor of Saharawi tea in our snow desert cave. The clear highlight of our journey, we enjoyed three sets of Mustafa’s lovingly prepared tea. Followed by some South African humour and some Maths riddles (yes, only Maths!. Kip would have been proud), the evening was a huge success.
Unfortunately, all good things come to an end. The following morning, following heavy snowfall, the cave roof had lowered and a fault had developed on top that threatened to cover the entrance. We quickly evacuated and made our way back to the car. The strong winds propelled us, sometimes forward, sometimes sideways, occasionally flattening us. In fact, they were so strong that the lighter of us, Mustafa, Fanele and Kopano had to take off our skis and walk down the slope, to add irony to the situation.
Between finding our feet on skis again, to conquering the cold, to sleeping in a snow cave, the Ski-snøhul PBL was a smashing hit!
Feb 012008
This was a project from the thriving Spanish Department that had not one, but two PBLs this time.
Sotra is a high school 20 minutes by car outside Bergen, on the island of Bildøy. Besides academics it offers special studies like gourmet cooking and auto repair. They have recently introduced Spanish in the curriculum, which has proven spectacularly popular with 60 students in three different levels.
Their teacher, Angelica from Chile, came to Bergen as a little girl with her parents who were refugees from Pinochet’s regime. She contacted Nordic to have some link with our Spanish Department and after a visit last September, this PBL was planned.
The first day we met a group of five students and Angelica at Bergen bus station and we visited Gamle Bergen, an area that dates back to the early history of the city with stone buildings overlooking the sea and narrow cobblestone streets. We did a lot of walking in Sandviken and climbed up into a park that was the original lookout of the medieval city onto the fjord, with ruins of an old fort.
Next stop was the imposing Rozenkrantz Tower, the medieval fortress that houses Haakon Hall. We climbed up to the tower decorated in the traditional Viking style and imagined how royalty lived in those days of sword fights and cruel winters.
Nearby lies the oldest part of Bergen called Bryggen: we stopped a moment to see Snorre Siggurdsson’s monument across from the wonderful Maria Church. Snorre compiled the Icelandic sagas and influenced English and European literature with the haunting tales of warriors and ships that crossed the oceans and, incidentally, even made it to America before the Spaniards.
We were then in the oldest part of Bergen whose foundations could be seen in the Bryggen Museum. We walked amid wooden houses so close together that they literally propped one another. The museum exhibits remnants found in excavations of medieval Bergen and even a reconstructed Viking ship.
As a bonus, we had a special exhibition on the top floor of reconstructed King Tut’s clothes, done as a special project by British historians that researched findings in his tomb in Egypt.
After all this culture and history, students needed some refueling and Sotra school gallantly invited us to Pepe’s Pizza beside the Hanseatic Museum for an all-you-can-eat…er…marathon. All the while as throughout the cultural walk about, Latinos (Adriana, Adrian, Aladino and Ruben) as well as Sanela chatted in Spanish with the Sotra people that were trying to put into practice their recently acquired language.
We were hosted in students’ and Angelica’s homes and by all accounts later in the evening we were all comfortable and having a great time.
Day two began at 9 and it was Nordic’s turn to show who we are and what we do, so there were presentations and demonstrations in Spanish, of course. Aladino spoke and showed a video of Save The Children. Sanela talked in flawless Spanish of her Mottak service. Ruben did a Power Point presentation of the political situation in Latin America during the era of dictatorships and, more recently, of populist presidents.
Of course, music and dancing could not be absent in Spanish, so Adrian and Adriana demonstrated salsa and reggaeton to the hot sound of Gasolina and other classics that got Sotra students in the mood. Our presentations were done twice, first in the Spanish class and then, after a great lunch prepared by our student hosts, for a larger audience in the auditorium; but the dance was done on a stage in the kantina and we can say that our people had the whole of Sotra school dancing; well, almost…
The PBL was a great mixture of knowledge, interaction and good vibes between two cultures that have very little in common. Sotra students and teachers were extremely receptive and generous, warm and welcoming. We hope to do this again next year.
