Foreign exchange student comes to Newcastle

Hannah Gross 
NLJ Correspondent
 
With the new school year comes new faces, and this year Newcastle High School is hosting a foreign exchange student from the Netherlands. 
Louisa Rietra, who is 16 years old, arrived on Aug. 10, and will stay with Michael and Janice Freeman for a full school year, although she’s not sure exactly when she’s leaving yet. 
What sparked Rietra’s initial desire to apply for the exchange program was the foreign exchange student who came to her school in the Netherlands. 
“She (the student) said it was a lot of fun,” Rietra said. Rietra figured if she didn’t do it, she’d regret it later in life. 
Transitioning to a new school is tough for some students, but Rietra didn’t find it too difficult. 
“It’s pretty easy,” she said. “I was mostly excited.”
Over the past couple of weeks, Rietra has already made new friends through school and volleyball practice. She is taking several classes at the high school, including math, English, chemistry, choir, art, P.E., and yearbook, which is her favorite. 
While the school setup is similar between the two countries, there are some differences. Rietra explained that in the Netherlands, everyone eats together during lunch, but when she came here, she noticed that many of the students jumped into their cars and went off campus to get lunch. 
The parking lot is also a lot smaller at her school because most students ride their bikes to school. 
During her free time back home, Rietra enjoyed spending time with family, hanging out with friends, and playing field hockey. 
While she could have gone to high school in Upton, the Freemans decided that it’d be better for her to go to school in Newcastle since both of Rietra’s hosts work in Newcastle. Michael Freeman envisioned getting stuck in town due to a snowstorm with Rietra being almost 30 miles away in Upton. He decided it would probably be better if they were all in Newcastle for Wyoming’s unpredictable weather. 
Freeman got involved with the foreign exchange student program when he saw a Facebook post announcing Rietra’s need for a host family. Freeman said that he asked himself, why not?
 “It was a wild hair,” he said. “I’d recommend it to anyone.”
Freeman said that it’s “been a blessing” to have Rietra with them and she fits right in. 
“It adds a whole new spice to life,” he said. “We enjoy the heck of it.” 
Freeman said they are trying to learn Dutch, which is Rietra’s native language, while she is here. He figured that because she has to speak English, they can try their hand at Dutch. 
Rietra already speaks fluent English because she’s required to take it at her school and she’s watched many English-speaking movies. In addition to those two languages, Rietra also knows a little bit of Spanish, French and German. While she doesn’t know Spanish and French fluently, she said that she could probably speak German without much difficulty.
According to Freeman, Rietra is very advanced and he has learned a lot since her arrival – probably more than she has. He thinks it’s due to the differences in grading between her school and American schools. He said that homework isn’t graded very often so students can work at their own pace and choose to either slack off and suffer the consequences or learn to push themselves in their work. 
“It causes a better work ethic,” Freeman said. 
Since coming to the Black Hills area, Rietra has gone with the Freemans to Mt. Rushmore and Reptile Gardens and said she looks forward to doing things she’s never done before. 
“It’s going to be a fun year for us,” Freeman said.