Teleconference

On August 2, 1997 twelve people representing the Southern Regional School District treveled to the NTT studio in New York to participate in a video conference of a ceremony to present copies of the picture to six of the ten "children".

Representing the Southern Regional contingant included, Curtis Clancy and two of his sisters, Principal Jan Kristberg, town councilman John Spodafora, Japanese teacher Tsuneko Kojima, Internet teacher Art Wolinsky, and students Mike Mariano, Anthony Scali, Kari Spodafora, Cahterine Wareham, and Huber Gautier.

The mayor's office of Etajima hosted the teleconference in Japan. Representing Etajima was the mayor, a member of the Chamber of Commerce, six of the children in the picture, and students and teachers from Etajima High School.

Over the course of about an hour, greetings, questions and answers were exchanged. Students on both sides of the world were given the opportunity to demonstrate what they have learned in Japanese and English classes.

It was an exciting and rewarding experience for all of us from Southern Regional. We would like to thank our hosts at NTT for their wonderful work in setting up the teleconference. They were gracious hosts.

Special thanks and credit must be exteneded to Mika Maeda of the Hiroshima Volunteer Network and NTT for all of the work she did in tracking down the people in the picture and making all of the arrangements which allowed our students to participate in the teleconference. All we could do was make the initial contacts. It was really Mika, whose great expenditure of time and effort made the teleconference possible.


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