IRELAND: SUMMER ABROAD EXCEEDS EXPECTATIONS

By Claire Sherling

Dr. Sherling (top left), Noah Courtney USCGA, Charles Lampman
MMI, Kylan Byrd MMI, Nicole Peacock, Claire Sherling & daughter,
and Walker Gregory MMI '16 (bottom right)

For the second summer in a row, MMI has offered a study abroad program through the Gaelic Club in which students have the chance to travel to Ireland to experience the culture and music, hike the rugged mountains and seaside cliffs, but most importantly, to learn Irish Gaelic, the native language of the Irish people.  Led by MMI history instructor Dr. Rankin Sherling, the Gaelic Club meets once a week in Charlie Flaherty’s used bookstore in downtown Marion, As Time Goes By. It is mostly attended by cadets but MMI faculty and Marion locals also attend.  Most, but not all, have Irish or Scottish Gaelic ancestry. The club, however, is open to anyone interested in the language.  

Galway City on their first day in Ireland

This summer, Dr. Sherling brought four cadets and another instructor from MMI, Nicole Peacock (English) to the wild western coast of county Donegal to attend the adult language and cultural courses at Oideas Gael.  After getting their traveling feet wet in the city of Galway, one of the coolest places in all of Europe, the group from MMI stayed for a few nights in the small town of Carraroe in County Galway, which is a stronghold of the Irish language.  They then made their way up to Glencolmcille, nestled in the mountains of County Donegal on the northwest coast of Ireland.  

Charles Lampman, Walker Gregory (featured here),
Nicole Peacock and Claire Sherling hiked Slieve League,
the highest sea cliffs in Europe.

Students from around the world travel from near and far to attend the famous courses at Oideas Gael, so within days our cadets were befriending people from places like Ukraine, Poland, Germany, England, Scotland, France, the Czech Republic, Austria, and more. The cadets also made friends with people from all over Ireland, but particularly with the Glencolmcille locals.  They quickly made the town their home away from home, and when they weren’t attending language classes at the college, they were always either at music sessions in town, cultural classes at the folk village community center, dabbling in stone masonry during the Tirconnell Stone Festival, hiking the numerous trails around “Glen,” as the locals call it, or doing PT (physical training) on the beaches.  One cadet in particular got “in the best shape of his life,” he says.  But, beyond the physical training and language learned, the greatest accomplishment of the cadets can be measured in their personal
growth.  All four of them were pushed outside of their comfort zones from the very beginning.  The experience of travel and of going to school with people from various different countries allows for a widening of perspective that is invaluable.

From 5,000 year-old standing stones to this
 1800's watch-tower on top of a mountain,
there is always something incredible
to behold around every corner in Glen. 

That said, and despite the diverse  variety of students at the school, it was our MMI group of students that caught the attention of the people of Ireland, especially their media moguls who featured the cadets in two national newspapers, several radio programs and on the national news.  As the director of Oideas Gael Liam Cunningham put it, our group of students from MMI “had captured the imagination of the Irish people.”  The idea that cadets at a military school in rural Alabama were learning Irish during their free time was “fantastic.”  They were just incredibly impressed with the group’s dedication to learning the language and their determination and hard work in raising more than $18,000 to make the trip possible.  They certainly represented MMI very well and made our community proud. Check out the cadet’s video journal  HERE to watch their video and learn more about their first two weeks of the trip! 

EXTRA EXTRA!

 Noah Courtney as featured on RTE news.

After the first week of language classes, the Gaelic Club was featured on the 6 o'clock news on RTE, Ireland's largest news channel, with a special story on the trip and their fundraising efforts. (Watch the video HERE! ) In addition to the news features, Dr. Sherling was interviewed by Raidio Na Gaeltachta and on Raidio Na Life out of Dublin.  (Click the links to listen!) 

The Gaelic club was also featured in two large newspapers, The Irish Independent and the Donegal Democrat (Click to read!).  Stay tuned for Part 2 of the Ireland video journal.