An exchange student in the Portland metro area was sent home this week – eight months early. What horrible thing did he or she do, do you ask? Bring alcohol to school? Possess marijuana? Steal the family car? What could a well-adjusted, smart, 16-year-old exchange student do that would result in being sent home a […]
Those of us who work with high school exchange students generally are in favor of our students playing on their host school’s sports teams. We talk it up before the students arrive and we talk it up when we first meet the kids in August. We tell them what a great opportunity it is and […]
I’ve been thinking about this lately, as all the foreign student exchange programs struggled to find host families by the U.S. government deadline for all the students who had applied to come to the U.S. for an exchange year. It seemed harder this year to find families. That perception seems to be borne out by […]
I’m struck this year by the difficulties foreign exchange student programs in the United States seem to be having in finding host families; at least, that’s the sense here in Oregon. There are many more openings today in mid-August at many more schools than one would expect so late in the foreign exchange student placement […]
For today, I was originally going to write wise words from my experience as a host parent to explain why we do it — why some of us spend all this time and effort to bring an unknown teenager into our lives for up to 10 months (and some of us do this more than […]
August – the time of excitement and glamour as the exchange students arrive in the U.S. and elsewhere for their semester or year of adventure. What could be more fabulous than … wait, sitting around the house and watching TV? We have two exchange students who are starting the year with us. Viet Anh (Germany) […]
Tomorrow, July 30th, is arrival day for our first group of students, the “camper kids” – the exchange students who have been at an optional language and culture camp before joining their host families. The campers come to the U.S. several weeks to a month earlier than non-campers and tomorrow the first group will be […]
I’m a local exchange program coordinator. My husband and I work with teenaged exchange students between the ages of 15-18 who come to the United States for one semester or a full academic year to live with an American family and go to high school here. We help find host families, “match” students to a […]
