Educators from Holland experience American college system at IVCC

Four Dutch educators returned to their homes last weekend after an activity-filled two weeks exploring Illinois Valley Community College where they sampled local flavor that embraced birthday celebrations and Halloween treats.

Wilbert Smeets, Manon van de Rijdt, Karin van Zelst and Maud Slutter were part of a professional exchange program, and instructor Amanda Cook Fesperman (who hosted Smeets and van de Rijdt), program coordinator Tina Hardy (van Zelst) and instructor Jill Urban-Bollis (Slutter) will visit the Netherlands next spring.

The quartet observed classes and met with department coordinators and administrators on campus and visited local sites throughout the area – and along the way realized much about what the two countries and educational systems have in common and what makes each unique.

Hardy and van Zelst exchanged favorite cooking recipes and put their heads together over the ways they support students in their professional roles. Smeets and Cook Fesperman delighted in sharing insider history jokes.

As he watched a sociology professor’s jokes fall flat on the student audience, Smeets recalled his own teaching days.

“Nobody laughed. I can relate to that!” the history-teacher-turned-administrator said.

As Slutter tapped into her phone for translations during one lecture, she noticed she was the only one holding a phone. In a Dutch classroom, students would be glued to them.

Van de Rijdt and Smeets, whipped up a delicacy for a campus bake sale, mastering metric measurement conversions to conform with American instructions, and van de Rijdt mixed a spice blend from scratch to make it taste like home.

The visitors agreed America is a land of bigness – big houses, big stores, big portions, wide streets.

“My house could fit three times in Tina’s,” van Zelst said. On a visit to Costco, Slutter was awed by the selection. “Toilet paper was everywhere!”

The visitors sampled a variety of American foods.

“You fry everything here – pickles, chicken,” said Slutter, adding quickly, “I’m not complaining, because I eat everything.”

Slutter turned 29 during her visit, and the milestone was celebrated often, which made for special memories.

“We celebrated so many times I must already be 31 or 32,” she said.

The visitors couldn’t miss the sprouting election signs and Halloween decorations that competed for space in neighborhoods. Neither are widely on display in Holland. Smeets noted that Holland outpaces the United States with more than 40 political parties.

Another contrast: The Dutch bicycle to nearby work and to run errands, while Americans think nothing of traveling hours to a destination.

The visitors found Americans more outgoing than the reserved Dutch. Being welcomed everywhere they went “is like a warm bath,” Smeets said.

Except for Smeets and van Zelst, who work in the same school district, the four Dutch visitors were strangers when the trip began but quickly became friends. Van de Rijdt’s destination and arrangements were changed at the last minute, and she enjoyed being together with her countrymen.

Their schools have enrollment ranging from a few hundred students to several thousand, and Dutch colleges strongly emphasize vocational training and preparation.

Van de Rijdt particularly appreciated IVCC’s ESL classes and services like Project Success and the campus food pantry because she works in a school dedicated to the education of international refugees. She noted her school has more aides per student.

“We put money in helping hands rather than materials, which are a bit outdated.”

Like Hardy, who coordinates the Center for Accessibility and Neurodiversity, van Zelst supports students with accommodations but also works to reduce student absenteeism.

“I like Tina’s style, how her office feels like a living room. People can pop in and out and ask her something.”

Slutter was intrigued by the study buddy concept and hopes to adopt the same idea within her school. She trains students who will work in day care centers and classrooms and was well paired with her host, Urban-Bollis, who teaches educational psychology.

Urban-Bollis enjoys both traveling and hosting exchange students. She hopes her experiences “excite my students to travel and meet new people and have new experiences,” she said. “Sometimes we get into circles and forget what is outside of them.”

The exchange program is conducted through the Illinois Consortium for International Studies and Programs.