the experience of a lifetime.

"I got to go abroad and work in a foreign country and meet people of a different background,'' Miss Dawson said. "I've learned things about a different culture.'' "People were very warm and very friendly and I really felt at home,'' Miss Dawson, 17, told The Royal Gazette . "Everybody greeted you with hiya.'' The Commonwealth Youth Exchange, intended to establish a continuing link between Britain and other Commonwealth countries in the world, was begun in the early 1970s. Bermuda joined in 1978.

Applicants must be between 15 and 24 years old and involved in community service.

First, Miss Dawson had to write an essay explaining why she wanted to participate in the exchange. Once she cleared that hurdle, she was interviewed by a committee of former CYE members, who tested her knowledge of Bermuda, its Government, and asked her about herself.

Miss Karen Marshall, programme director at The Centre for the Ministry of Youth, Sport, and Recreation, said the exchange is "an excellent programme''.

To get through the screening process, "the main thing is knowing Bermuda and being able to sell Bermuda and be a good ambassador for Bermuda,'' she said.

"That's what we look for.'' Once chosen, the work of the team of youths had just begun. At meetings every other week, Miss Dawson, group leader Miss Sarah Fletcher, and fellow exchange students Miss Teresa Correia, Mr. Steven Hardy, Mr. Dean Lottimore, Mr. Gavin Rayner, Mr. Julian Wheddon, and Miss Kimberley Zuill discussed how they would raise money to pay for the trip, and what types of jobs they were interested in performing as volunteers once they arrived in East Lothian, Scotland.

"The Government paid for six of our tickets and left us to fundraise for the rest -- which helped us to work together as a team and get to know each other,'' Miss Dawson said.

To spend last August in Scotland, the youths held bake sales, car washes, and operated food stalls at events like the Bermuda Day Festival. They exceeded their $3,000 fundraising goal.

She and the others stayed in a caravan park in Port Seton.

Miss Dawson actually had two work assignments in Scotland. While waiting for Cockenzie Nursery School -- her main work assignment -- to open, she spent three days working at Rowans Nursing Home for the Elderly.

Planning a career working with children, Miss Dawson was "very impressed'' with the nursery school.

"It was very concentrated on independence,'' she said. Although children at the nursery were only about four years old, they learned to cook and clean up, use tools like hammers and nails, and work on computers.

An in-depth study of AIDS was another "very educational'' aspect of the exchange, she said.

"We actually met an AIDS patient,'' she said. "He told us how he contracted it and what he's gone through, and how we can get the message through to other people.'' It was not all work, either. There was shopping, a nightclub/disco night, a visit to the Edinburgh Festival, a walking tour of the Royal Mile, lunch at the YMCA in the Scottish Highlands, and a visit to Holyrood Palace.

She spent a weekend in the home of Miss Linzi Simpson in Trenent and spent a day in a Scottish secondary school.

Some things took getting used to, like meals of haggis (made from sheep's organs and boiled in a skin made from the animal's stomach) with turnips.

"It didn't sound too appetising, but actually it tasted quite nice,'' she said. "It was pretty good as long as you didn't think about what you were eating.'' They brought home presents, like heather seed and a Scottish tartan. This summer, a group from Scotland will visit and work as volunteers in Bermuda.

Any eligible young person who is interested in visiting Scotland through the exchange next year should contact Miss Marshall at The Centre as soon as possible.

Miss Dawson, who is in her post-graduate year at Saltus Grammar, is planning to attend university in Canada in September.

She expects she will major in Education and would like to work with children after she graduates.

TRIP OF A LIFETIME -- Miss Robin Dawson, 17, said she will never forget the time she spent in Scotland as part of the Commonwealth Youth Exchange. Anyone interested in going in the summer of 1994 should contact Miss Karen Marshall at The Centre as soon as possible.