Building Bridges Across Borders: A New Fund Creates Opportunities for Global Connection
As Bay City and Ansbach, Bavaria, celebrate the 65th Anniversary of their sister-city relationship, John and Martha Kaczynski are helping ensure that friendship continues for generations to come.
By establishing the John and Martha Kaczynski Bay City Ansbach Sister City Fund at the Bay Area Community Foundation, the couple is creating opportunities for students and community members to participate in cultural exchanges, gain new perspectives, and build connections that extend far beyond a single trip.
For John and Martha, this milestone anniversary embodies more than six decades of history. It represents friendships built, lives changed, and a legacy worth investing in for the future.
Long before their love for international partnerships became a shared mission, their love of pizza brought them together.
For John and Martha, their partnership began with a stolen slice of pizza.
The two met at a community event when Martha noticed John had two leftover slices. With her confidence and humor, she asked if she could take one.
“I’m going to steal your pizza,” Martha joked. And she did.
What started as a playful interaction grew into a lifelong love, rooted in community, service, and a shared belief that meaningful connections can change lives.
A Legacy of Connection
For Martha, cultural exchange is deeply personal.
A lifelong resident of Frankenmuth and a fourth-generation member of the Bavarian Inn Zehnder family, Martha grew up surrounded by German culture and traditions. Her family has been involved since the inception of Frankenmuth’s sister-city relationship with Gunzenhausen, Germany, in 1962—a partnership that has created opportunities for generations of students and families. Those experiences showed her the lasting impact that international relationships can have.
“Those students who have gone there – it’s life-changing,” Martha shared. “To realize the world really isn’t that big, and the relationships you can have, especially through face-to-face interaction, are something special.”
John’s path to international engagement came through his passion for public service and his connection to Bay City.
Like Martha, whose family came to the United States from Germany in the mid-19th century, John also has deep family roots in the region. His great-grandparents emigrated from Poland and settled in Bay City in 1880 and, according to family history, helped the St. Stanislaus Kostka parish community build its present church, which opened in 1892. After the turn of the century, they moved to Auburn, where they helped establish St. Anthony of Padua Parish in 1901. The Kaczynski family has remained rooted in Auburn ever since.
Growing up in Auburn, John developed a strong connection to Bay County and later built a career focused on education, public policy, and community service. While visiting Germany with Martha and her family during the 55th Frankenmuth-Gunzenhausen Sister City celebration in 2017, he discovered the Bay City-Ansbach sister city relationship.
Upon returning to Bay City, he saw a 2016 newspaper article in The Bay City Times reporting that two Bay City residents, Walter Hagen and Monte Oswald, had traveled to Ansbach to try to reignite the relationship. Based on this, John saw an opportunity to bring new energy to the sister-city relationship.
That realization became the beginning of renewed collaboration between Bay City and Ansbach.
Rediscovering a Connection Worth Preserving
While Martha grew up understanding the importance of sister-city relationships through her family’s involvement with Frankenmuth and Gunzenhausen, John learned more about the history between Bay City and Ansbach during the before mentioned 2017 trip to Germany with Martha and her family. Inspired by the active relationship between Frankenmuth and Gunzenhausen, John began exploring what it would take to bring renewed energy to the Bay City-Ansbach connection. Through a conversation, Martha’s mother, Judy, helped solidify that commitment.
Judy, who had spent decades supporting Frankenmuth’s sister-city relationship, encouraged John to take action. “If you’re going to do it, do it,” she told him. “Somebody has to.”
Those words became the encouragement John needed to begin rebuilding connections between local schools, universities, community organizations, and leaders in both communities.
Through his role as co-director of the Gerstacker Fellowship Program at Saginaw Valley State University, he and his colleague Mary Anne Ackerman traveled to Ansbach and Gunzenhausen the following spring. The City of Gunzenhausen was instrumental in organizing the initial meetings in Ansbach. Gunzenhausen Tourism Director Ingeborg Herrmann and Second Mayor Friedrich Kolb helped Kaczynski and Ackerman connect with various stakeholders in Ansbach. During the visit, they met Melanie Herrmann, who coordinates Ansbach’s sister-city relationships, and Dr. Christian CA Gebhardt, an English professor at Hochschule Ansbach. After that trip, they decided the SVSU Gerstacker Fellowship Program would visit schools in both Gunzenhausen and Ansbach the following year.
Also in 2018, building on the goodwill mission Walter Hagen and Monte Oswald completed in 2016, John learned that Susan Elder, a German teacher at Bay City Central High School, was working to establish a student exchange program between Bay City and Ansbach. Inspired by her efforts, John met Susan for coffee at Harless + Hugh Coffee. What started as a conversation over coffee grew into a renewed partnership that connected students, educators, and community members across continents.
While Susan began building a student exchange program scheduled to commence in 2020, John and Mary Anne Ackerman traveled to Ansbach in 2019 with the SVSU Gerstacker Educational Fellows. Two Fellows from that initial trip continue to serve as educational leaders in Bay County: Jake Voisine at Bay City Western High School and Kathy Dardas at the Bay-Arenac ISD Career Center. Inspired by the trip, Kathy continues to work with Susan on K–12 exchanges to Ansbach.
Following the success of the initial fellowship trip, representatives from Ansbach visited Bay City in fall 2019, and planning began for a K–12 educational exchange in 2020. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic postponed the exchanges until 2022, when Bay City and Ansbach celebrated the 60th anniversary of their sister-city relationship in Ansbach in July. More than 50 representatives from Bay City, Bay City Public Schools, Bay-Arenac ISD, and Saginaw Valley State University participated in the celebration.
During the trip, Ansbach named the Bay City Brücke (Bridge). Later that year, in September 2022, approximately 25 representatives from the City of Ansbach and its schools traveled to Bay City for a reciprocal celebration. During their visit, Ansbach Platz, located in Uptown Bay City, was opened. The project was a collaboration among Bay-Arenac ISD, Bay City Public Schools, the City of Bay City, Leadership Bay County, Saginaw Valley State University, and the City of Ansbach and its schools.
Investing in Future Generations
Since 2019, the relationship has grown to include educational institutions such as Bay City Central High School, the Bay-Arenac ISD Career Center, and Saginaw Valley State University; community organizations such as the Great Lakes Bay Region DANK Club (German-American Club); the Bay Area Chamber of Commerce; and the City of Bay City. Students at these institutions have participated in exchanges, and educators have built partnerships. Members of the DANK Club who traveled during the 2022 and 2026 celebrations have forged deep friendships. At Saginaw Valley State University, many students from Hochschule Ansbach (Ansbach University) have lived in our region and studied at SVSU since 2021. This success in Ansbach has pushed SVSU to build more relationships in the region with institutions such as the University of Würzburg.
This new fund is designed to help ensure these opportunities continue for generations.
The Kaczynski’s hope the community will help make these exchange opportunities sustainable.
“We want organizations to put skin in the game,” John explained. “Your budget is a value statement. If this Sister City relationship is important, we want organizations to show that commitment by helping fund these exchanges as well.”
Left to right: Martha Kaczynski, George Kaczynski (middle), and John Kaczynski. Martha Kaczynski and John Kaczynski established the John and Martha Kaczynski Bay City Ansbach Sister City Fund through the Bay Area Community Foundation to create a lasting resource that supports cultural exchange opportunities, strengthens international connections, and helps future generations experience the educational and personal impact of this 65-year friendship.
For students, the impact goes far beyond a trip overseas. The experience offers exposure to new cultures, perspectives, and possibilities. John and Martha believe that these experiences can shape the future leaders of the community.
Susan Elder has seen the impact firsthand. She says the exchange gives students confidence, encourages them to take risks and try new things, and teaches life skills that are difficult to gain in a classroom alone.
“This exchange changes students’ perspectives, gives them confidence, and teaches life skills that only come with international travel,” Susan said.
The relationships students form can also continue long after the formal exchange ends. Many students stay in touch with their German partners and host families, while some return to visit one another years later. The connections also extend to the families who participate, creating friendships between local families who may never have otherwise crossed paths.
“The exchange has given the greater Bay City community opportunities to interact with students and teachers from our sister city, helping them to see not only the differences, but also the similarities between our two communities,” Susan said.
The Kaczynski’s hope their own family can be part of that legacy as well.
Their son, George, represents the new generation of connection, a reminder that relationships built through cultural exchange can continue beyond one person, one trip, or one moment in time.
John and Martha hope that students who participate in these exchanges will carry those experiences forward, remain involved in their communities, and inspire future generations to stay connected.
“They come back from Ansbach and give back to Bay City,” John said. “Hopefully they settle here, decide to have families here, their kids stay involved in the Sister City partnership, and the relationship continues.” Kaczynski has observed this success in the Sister City relationship between Frankenmuth and Gunzenhausen.
A Classroom Without Borders
At the heart of the Bay City-Ansbach Sister-City relationship is a belief that cultural exchange creates opportunities that extend far beyond travel. Through partnerships between educators, schools, and students, the relationship has become a powerful tool for learning, friendship, and personal growth.
For Susan Elder, who helped rebuild the relationship, the work represented something much larger than an educational partnership. “The relationship between Bay City and Ansbach is so valuable to me, both as a citizen of the region and as a teacher of young people,” Susan shared. “When the relationship faltered in 2016, I realized that we were at risk of losing a very important piece of our history, as well as a connection that has affected many lives in our community.”
Susan credits Walter Hagen and Monte Oswald with taking the first steps toward rekindling the relationship, and she is grateful to community partners like the Kaczynski’s, who helped rebuild it. Since becoming involved, she says the educational team has become like family, and the friendships formed in Ansbach have become deeply personal.
“Our friends in Ansbach are family, and sharing the power of that connection is a gift that will hopefully last for years to come.”
For Bay-Arenac Associate Director, Kathy Dardas, the partnership represents the power of connection through history, culture, education, and friendship. “My involvement has deepened my understanding of diverse educational practices and strengthened my commitment to learning from and collaborating with educators around the world,” Kathy shared. “Through the exchange of ideas, strategies, and experiences, I have gained valuable professional insights while forming lasting friendships.”
For Kathy Dardas, it all started with the inaugural 2019 Gerstacker Educational Fellowship trip to Ansbach. “I remember after that first trip that Kathy was very engaged and inspired to continue the relationship with Ansbach,” John Kaczynski said. “It was after that trip that a flame ignited, and she began working with Susan to involve the ISD as well.”
Through the sister-city relationship, students from Bay City and Ansbach have experienced each other’s communities firsthand. Students have attended classes alongside their peers, learned about different educational systems, explored local businesses and industries, and experienced daily life with host families. These experiences often create lasting impacts.
“I have witnessed firsthand how students gain a deeper appreciation for different cultures, learn about family life in another country, and develop a greater understanding of the similarities and differences between our educational systems,” Kathy said. “Traveling abroad and living with host families has also helped students develop greater confidence, independence, and a broader perspective of the world.”
For the students themselves, that broader perspective can be difficult to put into words, but their reflections offer a glimpse of just how deeply the experience can stay with them.
Lucianna Waldie, a student who participated in the 2026 K–12 exchange, expected her trip to Germany to teach her about another country, culture, language, and way of life. Instead, she said it taught her something much deeper: how much people around the world have in common.
“People are not as different as we are led to believe,” Lucianna wrote in a reflection on her experience. “We all have families, traditions, rules, struggles, and memories that shape who we are. We may express it all differently, but underneath it all, we are human.”
During her two weeks in Germany, Lucianna also formed a relationship with her host family that transformed the experience from a cultural exchange into something deeply personal.
“I somehow went from being a stranger to becoming a part of a second family,” she wrote. “Knowing I even have people all the way across the world that I can call family is something I am very grateful for.”
For Avery Alman, another student who traveled to Ansbach in 2026, the experience was equally transformative. Having first connected with German students through Zoom, Avery said meeting those students face-to-face made the relationships feel almost immediate.
“It’s hard to believe the people we met and bonded with had merely been faces on a Zoom call weeks before our excursion,” Avery wrote. “From the moment we met our host siblings face to face, I already knew the trip was going to be an incredible journey.”
For Avery, some of the most meaningful moments weren’t necessarily the planned excursions, but everyday experiences. Going to school with a host sibling, exploring Ansbach after a class, making friendship bracelets, solving puzzles, visiting a public pool, and simply spending time together.
“These little things we planned on our own were some of the highlights of my trip,” Avery reflected. “Just getting together with everyone and hanging out is what made this trip so awesome.”
Looking back, Avery described the exchange as an experience that expanded their understanding of the world and created relationships that went far beyond a traditional school trip.
“These programs aren’t your average school trip; you forge new bonds with incredible people.”
For Hudson Grandy, a Bay City Central High School student who participated in the GAPP Germany Exchange, the experience offered an opportunity to step outside the classroom and experience German culture firsthand. Living with a host family, visiting schools, and exploring cities throughout Bavaria allowed him to experience everyday life in Germany rather than observe it as a tourist.
“Living with a host family allowed me to learn much more about German culture than I ever could have from a textbook,” Hudson reflected.
Hudson also found that the differences between students from different countries often mattered less than the similarities they discovered.
“Even though we came from different countries and backgrounds, we quickly discovered that we had many things in common.”
Looking back on his experience, Hudson said the exchange encouraged him to step outside his comfort zone, learn about another culture, and form friendships that he hopes will last for years to come.
“My trip to Germany taught me that people can build strong connections with one another, even when they come from completely different parts of the world.”
For Susan, those connections are exactly why ensuring students have access to these experiences is so important. She says the students and teachers currently work diligently to raise money for each exchange, often planning and fundraising for two years. But even with those efforts, the cost can remain out of reach for some students.
“Unfortunately, even with fundraising efforts, some students cannot afford to travel,” Susan said. “It is those students who would benefit the most from international travel, but sometimes the cost is just too prohibitive.”
That is where Susan sees the new Kaczynski fund making a particularly meaningful difference.
“With this new fund, we should be able to support deserving students with this life-changing opportunity.”
As the educational exchange program continued to grow, so did the commitment to sustaining it. What began through the dedication of educators like Susan Elder and community leaders such as John and Martha Kaczynski has since expanded into the Bay County Intercultural Exchange, a nonprofit organization that coordinates and strengthens intercultural programming, educational partnerships, and student exchange opportunities connected to the Bay City–Ansbach Sister City relationship.
Today, the organization serves as a hub for educators, students, and community partners, ensuring these experiences continue to flourish while creating new opportunities for international collaboration.
The exchanges have also created opportunities for innovative collaboration between classrooms. Bay-Arenac ISD Career Center Retired Marketing & Management Educator, Lisa Forest, has seen firsthand how international partnerships can transform learning experiences for students.
Through a collaborative project between students in her Marketing & Management program and students in an economics program at the Ansbach FOS/BOS, students worked together virtually to identify a problem, develop a marketing plan, create materials, and present their ideas as a team. For one student who later traveled to Ansbach, the experience became even more meaningful when she saw the marketing materials she helped create featured at the school she visited.
“Through mutual respect, creativity, and entrepreneurship, we can collaborate to solve problems and allow people to flourish,” Lisa shared. “The sister-city partnership has provided a unique immersive opportunity for my students and me.” For Lisa, the relationships built through this partnership demonstrate the importance of international connection.
“I believe that lifelong friends are more likely to advocate for each other, collaborate to find solutions, and less likely to be combatants in times of trouble,” she said.
The new fund established by John and Martha will help ensure these opportunities continue for future students, educators, and community members. By providing financial support for participation in exchanges, the fund will help remove barriers and allow more individuals to experience the cultural, educational, and personal growth that comes from connecting with another community across the globe.
“This fund goes a long way to provide for the future of many more positive experiences for our students and the community,” Lisa said.
A Legacy That Continues
Sixty-five years after Bay City and Ansbach first formed their sister-city relationship in 1961, John and Martha believe the future of that connection depends on creating opportunities for people to experience it firsthand.
The new fund will provide up to $2,000 in matching funds each year to ensure that funding is available for students, educators, and community members to participate in exchanges that foster understanding, friendship, and lifelong connections.
“This is about fostering the Bay City–Ansbach relationship, but also bigger, fostering international relations,” Martha shared. A relationship that began generations ago continues today through the people who choose to invest in it.
“Reflecting back to that first visit to Ansbach 9-years ago, I am so proud of the engagement on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean,” said John. “Because of people like Susan Elder, Walter Hagen, Kathy Dardas, Lisa Forest, Dana Muscott, and Rachelle Hilliker in Bay City; Judy Zehnder Keller and Mary Anne Ackerman in Frankenmuth; Ingeborg Herrmann and Friedrich Kolb in Gunzenhausen; and all of our friends in Ansbach, including Melanie Herrmann, Dr. Christian CA Gebhart, Armin Jechnerer, and Christian Krug – the foundation has been laid. I hope this fund will help the next generation of leaders to be able to build upon it.”
Through this fund, John and Martha are ensuring that the next 65 years of friendship between Bay City and Ansbach are built on the same foundation as the first: curiosity, connection, and a belief that the world becomes smaller when people take the time to understand one another.
Organizations eligible for travel funding to Ansbach include Bay City Public Schools, Bay-Arenac ISD, the City of Bay City, DANK Club – Great Lakes Bay Region, and Saginaw Valley State University. All funding requests must demonstrate that matching funds are being provided by the organization the applicant represents in an official capacity. Please contact the Bay Area Community Foundation for more information.
I am proud to serve my community through my role at BACF. As a Program Officer, I collaborate with nonprofit, government, church, and school partners in Bay and Arenac counties to navigate our grant opportunities and find the right funding alignment. From project conception to post-award, I am your main contact for all things grants. Connecting organizations and donors who share the same vision and passion is at the heart of my work.
