Ten Botswana high school students are going to class in Miami thanks to a hotel worker

The 10 students from Botswana arrived in striped ties and blazers with palm tree lapel pins unsure of what to expect.

Miami Central Senior High’s Mighty Marching Rockets band greeted them in its signature green and white regalia. The students and their chaperones marveled as the color guard twirled flags and dancers in crop tops twerked.

It was a new experience — a very American one at that — just like seeing the ocean for the first time, globetrotting for 30 hours on their first plane ride and stepping inside a Walmart for the first time. It’s why the six girls, four boys, their headmaster and four adults came all the way from Ledumang Senior Secondary School in Gaborone, Botswana.

“It’s more than I expected. It’s beautiful,” said 16-year-old Atang Lejaki. “The cars, the beach, the people. It was a little bit scary, but we adjusted.”

Monday kicked off the two-week social experiment aimed at dispelling prejudices between Africans and African Americans, led by Miami Central alumnus Edwin Sheppard. In 2021, Miami Central will send students to study in Botswana. Named after a documentary created by Sheppard, the Blindfolded International Student & Cultural Exchange Program is the first program of its kind in Miami-Dade County Public Schools.

Sheppard was inspired to begin the exchange program when he took a side trip to Botswana for his 45th birthday. He interviewed students at Miami Central and Ledumang for his documentary, “Blindfolded: How They Hid My Heritage From Me,” and then set out to create the exchange program.

“When I was a kid, Africa didn’t look beautiful to me,” said Sheppard, who graduated from Central in 1991. “I didn’t have any aspirations to visit the country at all.”

Beyond the classroom, the visiting students are in for an authentic Miami experience. They have college visits lined up and trips planned to the Miami Seaquarium and to a Miami Heat game on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

But it all comes at a cost. Sheppard, a doorman at the Fontainebleau Miami Beach, has been fundraising mostly on his own. He’s held mixers and created competitions between Miami Central alumni classes to raise cash. So far, he’s raised half of his goal of $50,000 and is still soliciting donations through his nonprofit website, biscep.org.

“It’s not easy to pull something like this off,” Sheppard told the students. “Just seeing this, this is my reward. Just to see those faces and see how beautiful everyone is.”

Each African student was paired with one of Miami Central’s best students to tag along to all of their classes. Even Ledumang’s administrators will shadow Central’s administrative team in data and assessment meetings.

“The whole community is happy and excited,” said Central Principal Gregory Bethune. “I’ve been looking forward to this day for a very long time, guys. This is monumental. This is historic.”

They all mingled over American breakfast fare, scrambled eggs, sausage, grits and Welch’s fruit juice, and quickly found common ground.

Central’s visitors had questions about hairstyles and prom. Their hosts wanted to know what languages their visitors spoke (English, Setswana and a bit of French). They discovered they all like R&B music.

“I think the people here are so friendly and so different,” said Onneile Anita Mosokotso, 16. “The way they dress, especially the girls [and] their hair.”

The visiting students are quiet and soft-spoken — it’s rude to raise your voice in Botswana. The home students were eager to be acquainted.

“I thought you guys were gonna be quiet and stuff,” said Mmaha Ekon, a 17-year-old senior at Central. Her table, with two African students and three Central students, was erupting in laughter. “I’m an outgoing person but y’all are chill with me.”

Ekon can relate to them. She was born in Nigeria and came to Miami when she was 8.

“It was fun connecting with them and reliving my childhood,” she said. “I’m so excited to introduce them to Miami. I want them to have the same experience I had when I came here.”

School Board member Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall, I.C.A.R.E. (Inner City Alumni for Responsible Education) member William D.C. Clark and Superintendent Alberto Carvalho also stopped by the school to welcome the guests.

“There are still those, God bless them, who are interested in building bridges so we can meet in the middle,” said Carvalho, who said he is personally investing in sending Miami Central students to Botswana.

The African students lined up to get their student IDs. They’re invited to watch the Rockets take on the Hialeah-Miami Lakes Trojans at Thursday’s basketball game.

Miami Central senior Chase Bland, 17, lent his silver MacBook Air to Refilwe Maatla Molefi. He introduced her to his Advanced Placement English Literature class as “Fifi.”

She picked up on a few differences: There are no computers in the classroom back home, and the class sizes at Central are much smaller than at Ledumang.

Kelebogile Julia Raphotsana came with reservations. She was nervous about rumors that Americans do not like Africans. She warmed up in AP U.S. History with the help of her host, 16-year-old Asha St. Louis.

“I think they are great people, able to socialize,” Raphotsana said. “I just feel like I’m at home.”