In 2006, I was co-leader of a second People to People trip, this time to St. Petersburg. We visited a variety of schools, and I taught a lesson about the Great Depression and the New Deal at an all-girls school focused on the humanities. When I left St. Petersburg, I could not stop wondering why the Russian students I met seemed so much more optimistic about their futures than their American counterparts. I wonder about them now.
MARTHA RUSH 