<p>WashDad…in the first case, those things happen and it is difficult.
In the second case, the program should have stepped in and promptly shipped that girl back from whence she came. That was my point to the OP…check out the program and ask some tough questions of them.<br>
They should tell you that in the event of a situation, someone will come to the home IN PERSON to assess the situation and take the necessary action. </p>
<p>Did I mention the one about the 17 3/4 year old from Spain who broke into a very small town public library while carrying a knife? Not sure what he was thinking…the only thing in their worth stealing was about $3.55 in overdue fine money. </p>
<p>Anyway, long story short, it turns out they really do have that glass and phone set up in prison. </p>
<p>I am currently on my third. This last one is the hardest, because D is away at college. I think it only REALLY works if you have kids at home who can drive them and take them with, and you are no longer out of the “drive-'em, take 'em, those teen-age woes, stage.” The other thing is that the kid can go along on your child’s activites at first, and be introduced into things that they might be interested in, and they feel more comfortable at school those first few days because they know at least one person. And yes, they make their own friends. D was only in jr. high when the first one came over, and the second was here when D was a jr., (but although he met her friends, and was welcome, he went out and made some more to his liking) and the one thing you need to know is that they don’t open up for a while, and you will need to question and explain all kinds of things you hadn’t thought about, such as school rules. Mine were all from Germany, and they can wear what they want, leave class when they want, etc. All in all, a positive experience, but definitely won’t do it again, because it really is better if there are kids in the house. Your kids will learn a lot, and so will you. Go for it!</p>
<p>We’ve hosted 2. Our first girl was from Spain & was one of the best things we ever did. We have been to Spain to visit her & she’s been back to visit us twice. She loved everything about her experience here so it was easy. Our second girl from Germany we took at midyear because things weren’t going well at her first placement. It didn’t work out any better at our house. Her and my D ended up barely speaking, Crux of the problem was her american boyfriend and her wanting to spend all her time with him. I am the school liason with AFS in our district and most of the placements have been positive over the years.</p>
<p>Two more points to add: be sure your host child’s EC activities are “porous” and open for guest drop-ins. My S was put in with a family because they “shared an enjoyment of theater,” but in reality how interesting was it for him to go to weeks and weeks of the host kid’s school play rehearsals, in a different language with kids speaking so fast he couldn’t understand well…He gamely went to a few, but after awhile it was just jabber. He enjoyed attending the final presentation with the family, however. JUst try to see <em>realistically</em> what your kid’s activities would mean to the guest kid. </p>
<p>And of course if you take someone in, be ready to have them in no matter what happens to your family in the coming year. Here’s what made me think of that one:
My S was hosted for a month in Israel but when a grandparent died unexpectedly. They asked him to LEAVE for a week because they were very upset. Surely his presence added more strain to their situation. This is so untypical of warm Israeli hospitality! We were lucky b/c his program sent him to live in the living room of a cousin of ours, but she was a young mom with twins, so he sure did feel he was imposing there, too. He got the flu, slept upright on her reclining rocker for a week (all she had to offer), she brought him soup…that was a tough week. </p>
<p>Although I expected the “host family” would be the best part of his overseas program, it was a fizzle for these reasons. He tried, really hard, and it was only one month of hosting…still, what a disappointment!</p>
<p>Rest of his program, back in dorms, rocked! </p>
<p>So I wonder if your program has some kind of fall-back system in case you need an unexpected week to “unload” the guest student, in event of emergencies in your own household?? If not, then I guess you’re in it for the duration, and no “unloading” for emergencies.</p>
<p>I have hosted numerous ESL students from Korea, though slightly older than HS age. They have been uniformly quite considerate, pleasant, appreciative and easy to live with. Some have been more, or less interested in participating in family life, but that is a feature of being a bit older, and having a large peer group of ESL students in their school. </p>
<p>Should you end up with a Korean, PM me for suggestions on things I’ve found to help them with some of the cultural differences.</p>
<p>We are currently hosting an exchange student from Spain and I can’t imagine that it could work out any better. Originally she had been placed with another family, actually the local coordinator’s family, but it wasn’t a good fit. In fact, it hasn’t been a good fit for about 6 students now. As parents we would not want our child living in that home and felt we had to have her come live with us. We’ve never regreted it. Just as an idea the of the type of host parent the coordinator is she dropped my student by the mall the first day and came back for her six hours later. She ran out of money and got tired of walking and just sat for several hours. The original family have a moody not polite 8th grade girl and no high school students, the dad of the house doesn’t work and is up all night sleeping during the day, they had limited food in the home and while living there my student qualified for the free income based lunch program. I don’t understand the reasoning in placing a student in a home that is already having financial problems. I believe this local coordinator gets $ for each student she places and if she can’t place them she has them stay in her home. I suspect she then gets money for having to house them. I wish I could verify that last part (the organization is CIEE). She would tell the students if you leave I’m just getting another student. But, back to the positive. Our student has been a wonderful addition to the family. She & my daughter have become very good friends and my daughter will be headed to Spain for a visit later this summer. We have met and spent time with the parents. I think that just asking questions demonstrates that you would be a good caring host parent.</p>
<p>My family has hosted a few French students for a few weeks at a time and we had a German for a year last year.</p>
<p>I’m an only child and it was a really good experience having to live with someone else like that, share attention, etc. She was also really outgoing and I was a little more introverted and it really made me more extroverted (or at least less introverted). We still talk all the time and call each other sis and stuff. It was amazing and we got lucky having such a great experience with it.</p>
<p>The one thing I really regret was not learning as much as I would have liked about German culture/language. About all I learned was one word (food!) and about the education system. I would have loved to have learned more from her.</p>
<p>Just keep in mind that if it works well, your exchange student becomes a true member of your family. One year in your home and then they go home maybe never to be seen again. It is like losing a child. Be forwarned this is not a pleasant experience. The better the match the harder the seperation.</p>
<p>We had a student from Hong Kong. Sometimes the experiences were wonderful. We celebrated some holidays like the Moon Festival and he cooked for us once. It was also interesting and fun to get to teach someone about America. Sometimes though, for whatever reason this kid or we had, we didn’t get along. I don’t know if was cultural differences or what, but he ate a ton of our food, but when he bought his own stuff he barely touched it. Most nights he would sit in the dining room and study and draw from when he got home from school until he went to bed. We didn’t talk that much sometimes. I would do it again though.</p>
<p>When both sons were home, we hosted a Korean student for two weeks (Horrible experience; he was only 13 and unable/unwilling to even try speaking English) and several Japanese students for a month or two at a time. They were generally quite poor at spoken English, but tried hard and were very pleasant and fun to be with. We enjoyed all of them, and since our son was learning Japanese, communication was not a problem.</p>
<p>When my older son left for college and younger son was a junior, we hosted a German boy for a year. Originally, he was only to stay for a semester. However, we liked him and he liked us, so he ended up extending the time to a full school year. His English was excellent, and so communication was no problem at all. (I did feel sorry for him, however, when the first book read in English class was The Scarlet Letter. You should have seen his lists of vocabulary words!)</p>
<p>There was some tension at first between our son and the student, as son’s friends were so interested in the new person that they tended to ignore our son, and he felt some jealousy. That was only temporary, however, and the two became good friends. The student did also develop his own friends, including a girlfriend, but he and our son spent a lot of time together. The student even taught our son how to snowboard. The student also took part in some different activities, such as soccer, which I enjoyed watching.</p>
<p>As akdaddy said, it was hard when he left, as he had become like a member of the family. What was even harder on us AND son is that, once gone, he seemed to forget us and never called or wrote. Our son did occasionally call him, but the relationship did not last as we had hoped it would. Still, we do not regret the experience; we all learned a lot and enjoyed having him.</p>