With the school year of 2023-2024 being seen as a year of change, a local high school by the name of Classical Academy High School received a massive change during its school year in the form of its first-ever Saudi Arabian foreign exchange student, Zainah Al-Sajjan. “I just wanted to study abroad for my senior year in high school because I’ve always had plans to study abroad, whether it be a college or high school or anything. I wanted my senior year to count and I don’t think I would have had the full senior year experience had I just spent it back home,” Al-Sajjan said. Coming to a new country and going to a completely foreign school would be nerve-wracking for anyone but Al-Sajjan took it head on and found the school’s environment and its people very warm and welcoming to her. “I’m friends with Mr. Moen, I can actually talk to him. And I can talk to my assistant principal. So there is a kind of a respectful, yet friendlier relationship between you and the faculty,” Al-Sajjan said. Al-Sajjan has also found that unlike back home, the social barriers here in America and at Classical are far more relaxed when talking to people. Something that although we here in America take for granted or don’t even take advantage of it is something that is still very foreign to others. “I’m definitely going to miss that lack of social barriers. You can just walk up to someone and ask them how their day is,” Al-Sajjan said. The impact that Zainah Al-Sajjan has had on the school and its community is nothing short of incredible with her serving as a student and ambassador for her country. “Her personality, her winsome personality, just totally obliterated those natural human instincts to point fingers and to kind of almost like, radicalized the feelings towards a certain people group, etc, ” said Christopher Holz, English Four Teacher. Despite having other foreign exchange students before, Zainah Al-Sajjan stands out for being a beacon of unity in the community, sharing her world with those unaware of it, and changing all of us for the better, forever. 

However, we were not the only ones to be educated in all of this. When asked about what preconceptions she had about America, Al-Sajjan stated that they weren’t all that great. “I had this very common misconception that Americans are lazy and we’re so much more ambitious and hard-working, but I came here and I was like, wow, these people have so many hobbies, and they have so many things to do and extracurriculars. And they have so many ambitions” said Al-Sajjan. The terrific opportunities offered by both Classical Academy as well as her exchange program allowed for a year full of learning and growing on both accounts, further showing that everyone has so much to learn from one another.  

With the school year coming to a close Zainah begins to look to the future beyond Classical Academy. On May 20th Zainah Al-Sajjan will return to Saudi Arabia to graduate in her home country and will then go to study abroad again for college. “I was recently accepted to Queen Mary University of London and plan to study economics,” said Al-Sajjan. After having spent her senior year here at Classical Academy Al-Sajjan will miss the school’s friendly and open environment and all of the friends that she has made this year. “I mentioned that everyone here has their cliques but it’s not as clicky as it is back home…there are so many people for me to miss because I’m just kind of a very social person,” said Al-Sajjan. The impact that Zainah Al-Sajjan has had on the school, the staff, and the student body is nothing short of remarkable and life-changing. Her personality, her intelligence, and her willingness to both teach about her world as well as being ready to learn as much as possible from her American peers show us that we too should strive to be just like her.