Category: Pre-exchange advice

Many websites which purport to give advice to exchange students will tell you that everyone should become an exchange student.

That’s nuts.

Definitely not for everyone

This is the correct formulation:

Everyone should probably think about becoming an exchange student.

But they should only become an exchange student once they’ve informed themselves about what exchange students do, and the pluses and minuses of becoming an exchange student, and made an informed decision based upon that information.

One of the aims of this website is to give you such information, to help you figure out whether or not a student exchange is something you’d like to do.

In order to figure that out, you need to consider two questions:

• What it is that exchange students actually do?
• Do you want to spend six months or a year or another period of time doing those things?

The aim of this page is to answer the first of those questions.

School

If you do decide to become an exchange student, you’ll spend the majority of your time attending school.

Of course, the school will be in another country, which will add novelty value and make it interesting, at first. After a while, though, your day-to-day routine will probably be very similar to the one you have (or had) as a school student in your home country.

The school that hosts you is unlikely to have high academic expectations of you. For example, unless you have arranged for the grades you earn whilst on exchange to count towards your grades at home, you probably won’t be required to sit exams or submit assignments along with the rest of the class.

However, the school (and your host family and exchange organisation) will expect you to show up to school, pay attention and take notes in class, and not disrupt your classmates. If you cut class regularly, your school and possibly your exchange organisation will ask you to improve your attendance, or leave.

If you don’t want to prolong your time in school, or can’t imagine yourself spending a whole year attending school rather than travelling or earning money or socialising, a student exchange is not for you.

Language learning

In addition to attending school, most exchange students have to spend a large amount of time learning a foreign language.

Learning a foreign language is far harder than most people imagine. True, you will learn much vocabulary and many idioms by osmosis because you are in a country where you are surrounded by people who speak the language. However, you will still need to spend many hours on your own rote learning vocabulary and grammar, and doing grammar exercises.

Your host family, school classmates and exchange organisation will take an interest in how your language skills are developing. To a degree, they will judge the success or otherwise of your youth exchange on how well you learn the language of your host country.

In other words, if you don’t learn their language well, they may think that your exchange has not been a good one. That may be an unfair assessment, but c’est la vie.

Don’t become an exchange student in a country where you’ll need to learn a foreign language if you aren’t prepared to work hard at learning that language.

Assimilation

One of the big aims of the student exchange movement is for exchange students to assimilate into the cultures of their respective host countries.

If you decide to go on exchange, your exchange organisation and host family will expect you to fit in with the routine and lifestyle of your host family. That means eating what they eat, keeping the same hours as them, respecting their belongings, adapting to their household rules and routines, respecting your host parents in the same way you respect your biological parents – if not more so – and making an effort to get along with your host siblings.

Outside the home, you will have to respect the laws of your host country, respect the rules of your school, and generally be a good citizen who keeps a low profile.

The flip side of all of this is that you will be expected to leave behind, or stop doing, some things that you do in your home country. Your parents at home might have no problem with you staying out until all hours, or staying up late on social media, or talking for hours on the phone, but your host family’s rules might not permit any of those activities. Likewise, you may participate in certain pastimes or hobbies at home that may be impractical for you to continue while you’re an exchange student. Fans of horse riding and playing the bagpipes, take note. You will have to find new pastimes in your host country to fill the void.

If you can’t imagine changing your lifestyle or habits, then a student exchange is definitely not for you.

Free time

Exchange students spend the majority of their evenings, weekends, and other free time with their host families.

Most host families will encourage exchange students in their care to socialise with people from their schools, other exchange students, and family friends. However, host families and exchange organisations also have a clear expectation that exchange students will spend a good deal of their free time at home with their host families rather than outside the home. They will certainly discourage students from treating the house of their host families as a hotel – as places for sleeping and getting free food in between socialising and partying.

If you want to spend a year or six months going out and meeting people and not spending any time at home in a family environment, a student exchange is not for you.

Travel

Being a foreign exchange student is not the same as being a tourist.

In fact, some exchange organisations or host families may prevent you from undertaking any independent travel. They may only permit you to travel in the company of your host family, or to visit people known by your host family, or as part of trips organised by your exchange organisation.

Note that, if you do become an exchange student, you will almost certainly have opportunities to travel. During my exchange year, I went on the following trips:

• A five-day skiing holiday with my first host family in the Swiss Alps.
• A weekend in Basel (city in Northern Switzerland), staying with another exchange student and her family.
• A five-day trip to Paris to visit my sister, who was also on exchange at the time.
• Another skiing holiday with my first host family.
• A two week long European tour organised by Rotary Switzerland.
• A weekend in French-speaking Switzerland with a family from my Rotary host club.
• A two-week visit to a small town in Bavaria, Germany, staying with Rotarians from the partner club of my Swiss host club.
• A weekend in Zermatt hiking in the hills surrounding the Matterhorn, with a couple from my Rotary host club.
• A week in Berlin with my third host family.
• A skiing holiday in the central Swiss alps with my final host family.
• Throughout the year, weekend trips to Geneva, Liechtenstein, Bern and other cities in Switzerland, organised by former Rotary exchange students, culminating in a final trip to Zermatt, where we snowboarded at the foot of the Matterhorn.

You get the idea. I did plenty of travelling. You will likely have similar opportunities, should you choose to go on exchange.

Note, however, that the travel will not be wholly on your terms and will rarely be unaccompanied. There almost certainly won’t be any month-long, solo backpacking trips around Europe. If you are interested in more independent travel, a student exchange is not for you. You would be far better off just taking a long holiday, or undertaking a university exchange later on.

Work

I’m not aware of any foreign exchange student who sought and obtained paid employment whilst on exchange.

For starters, the types of visas given to high school exchange students usually don’t allow the visa holder to seek paid employment. Even if you were able to get a working visa – which is surprisingly difficult in many countries – your exchange organisation may not allow you to work whilst you are on exchange.

If you want to work overseas, a student exchange is not the right way to do it. You need to consider undertaking a gap year or working holiday.

Drinking, driving, dating, drugs

If you decide to go on exchange, your student exchange organisation might prohibit you from drinking, dating, and certain other activities. The prohibited activities may include activities which you partake in at home, or which you feel you are entitled to partake in because of your age or because other people around you are doing them.

Rotary is mildly famous for prohibiting Rotary exchange students from drinking, driving, dating or taking drugs – the so-called “four ‘D’s”. No doubt other student exchange organisations have similar rules which they expect participating exchange students to abide by.

With the exception of the “no drugs” rule, most of these rules are a bit flexible. For example, nearly all exchange students get briefly romantically attached to someone while they’re on exchange. Such relationships are usually OK provided they don’t get too intense or too physical.

Exchange organisations and host families usually also tolerate a low level of drinking alcohol, particularly in countries like Belgium, Germany and France, where minimum ages for alcohol consumption are either low or routinely ignored.

Most exchange students will also operate a vehicle at least once or twice while they are on exchange, usually in the course of helping out their host families.

In a nutshell:

• Going to the movies or hanging out at school with a girlfriend while you’re on exchange is usually OK. Doing things that could result in her getting pregnant is definitely not OK.
• Having a beer at home with your host brother whilst watching a soccer game on TV is OK. Getting drunk and passing out in the city and missing the last train home is not OK.
• Reversing your host parents’ car out of the driveway so that your host father can get the other car out of the garage and park it on the street is usually OK. Cruising around town in your host parents’ car without them being in it is definitely not OK.

Of course, where the rules are not flexible is where the conduct in question is illegal in your host country. For example, the drinking age in most of the United States is 21 years old – beyond the age at which you can be a high-school exchange student. Exchange organisations usually also have a zero-tolerance policy for unlicensed and uninsured driving, sex with minors or non-consensual sex, drug trafficking, and drug consumption where it is illegal. Any such conduct will lead to the student being sent home at best, or reported to the police at worst.

If you want to spend your time drinking and getting high, getting intimate with other people and driving around, a student exchange is not for you. A university exchange in a few years’ time will give you more freedom to do such things.

Not just negatives

You may conclude from the paragraphs above that there are only negative things about being a foreign exchange student.

I hasten to add that there are many benefits to going on exchange, as well. From my perspective, the benefits far outweigh the limitations on freedom and other negative aspects outlined above. I am merely trying to give you an accurate picture of what being an exchange student is like, so that your decision about whether to undertake an exchange is an informed one. The issues outlined above seem to be the ones which cause exchange students (and their host families) the greatest trouble.

Typical foreign exchange student routine

So, what does a typical day in the life of an exchange student look like? Mine used to look something like this:

School day routine

6.00AM: Wake up, shower and dress for school, eat breakfast.

6.45AM: Leave home on bike for 10-minute ride to train station.

7.00AM: Board train for 45-minute train journey into town. Most other school students on the train spent the time studying. I spent the time cramming German grammar or trying to read German books (impossible and very slow at first, easier and easier as the year went on).

7.45AM: Arrive at train station closest to school. Walk to bus stop and board bus for 10-minute ride to school.

8.35AM: First lesson of the day started.

11.35AM: 90-minute lunch break started (note that many schools in Europe have a long lunch break to allow students to travel home and eat lunch with their parents).

1.05PM: Afternoon lessons began.

4.35PM: End of school day. Board bus for trip to train station.

5.00PM: Train home. Again, most students would spend the train trip studying, in order to get a head start on their homework.

6.00PM: Arrive home. Do homework, study German or read newspaper until dinner time.

6.30PM: Usual dinner time.

7.30PM: Social time with host family, usually spent watching TV, lingering over dinner and chatting, or (in summer time) doing something outside like playing table tennis.

9.00PM: Say good night to host family, brush teeth, prepare for bed.

9.30PM: Lights out.

Weekend routine

Friday night: After dinner, visit pub or café with host sibling or other exchange students.

Saturday morning: Sleep in (a necessity after five 6 AM wakeups in a row).

Saturday afternoon: Family lunch, followed by some activity with members of host family (typically, sport, shopping, or helping with chores) or free time.

Saturday night: After dinner with host family, pub or café visit with similar-aged host sibling or other exchange students.

Sunday morning: Sleep in, followed by an hour of chatting to parents at home (after getting host family’s permission)

Sunday afternoon: Free time, usually a bike ride or run for me if weather permitted.

Further research

The information above is taken from my own experience and the experience of people I’ve spoken to, including former exchange students and former host families.

I urge you to seek additional information from people at your school or living in your area who have previously been foreign exchange students. Ask them how they spent most of their time, and how they found that life as an exchange student differed from life in your home country.

Decision time

Once you have as complete a picture in your mind as possible of what a foreign exchange student does, ask yourself this question:

Given my personality, my goals in life, my work ethic and my personal strengths and weaknesses, and given what I now know about the life of an exchange student, am I prepared to live that life for six or twelve months?

It’s a very tough question. Make sure you answer it as slowly as you need to, and as honestly as you can.

Good luck,

Matt

This post is directed at anyone who is interested in being a foreign exchange student, but is hesitating because he or she isn’t sure whether she has the right personality type.

He or she may be worried that she isn’t outgoing enough, or smart enough, or good enough at languages, or popular to be an exchange student.

Anyone having such thoughts is making the error of assuming that there is some essential personality trait which exchange students need in order to be successful.

No one skill

For the record, there is no single, all-important personality trait which exchange students have to have.

In fact, being an exchange student is a multi-disciplinary occupation. You need a combination of skills to do well.

An outgoing personality helps, but it is not enough

Many people would assume that being outgoing is the most important characteristic for an exchange student. After all, exchange students are constantly meeting new people.

I certainly worried about not being outgoing enough before I went on exchange. I was, and always have been, introverted, and worried that not being outgoing would be a big disadvantage.

That turned out not to be the case.

In fact, I met a lot of outgoing people who weren’t very successful as exchange students. One talked far too much, particularly about herself, which got tiring very quickly. Another was immature and was always doing things like cutting class to go and smoke pot.

Although these students had the advantage of being outgoing and extroverted, that advantage was cancelled out by their less positive personality traits.

I wasn’t outgoing, but I still did well. That was because I had enough positive personality traits to cancel out my inherent shyness. That was the case for a number of other exchange students I met, who were less outgoing, but made up for it by being mature, studious, having good judgement, and so on.

Essential foreign exchange student characteristics

You don’t need to be outgoing to succeed as an exchange student. But there are a number of other personality traits that are essential for anyone going on exchange. In no particular order, these are as follows:

Openness

One of the big goals of going on exchange – if not the whole point of going on exchange – is to try new things.

You must be open to changing your lifestyle, habits, diet and pastimes to fit in with your host family and host country.

You must also be prepared to establish new and meaningful relationships – particularly with your host family – which will require you to be honest and open about your feelings.

Hard work

You must be prepared to put in the work to succeed as an exchange student.

Any former exchange student will tell you that it takes effort to make an exchange work.

The main task that most exchange students need to work at is learning a new language. As discussed elsewhere, that is a monumental task and one which takes much time and energy.

Even if you won’t be learning a new language, you’ll need to work hard at building and maintaining new relationships, attending school, being friendly and outgoing even if you don’t always feel like it, overcoming culture shock, and so on.

Persistence

US actor and film director Woody Allen said that 80% of success is simply turning up.

At the start of your exchange, you’ll be a rookie at virtually everything, and will do many things badly. Your language skills may be poor. You’ll have no idea how to get around. Even the local currency may be a struggle. You’ll embarrass yourself in front of your host family, school mates, and random strangers.

All of these things will get better over time. The key is to keep going. You need to have the kind of personality which lets you persist and keep “turning up” in spite of these minor, day-to-day setbacks.

Sense of humour

Exchange students need to have a sense of humour. They need to be able to laugh at themselves and see the funny side of their sometimes-embarrassing attempts to fit in and adapt to their new host countries.

A good sense of humour also helps students to integrate with their host families and school colleagues.

Maturity and acceptance of authority

Foreign exchange students also need to be mature enough to accept the authority of others.

Simply put, there are times when you need to be able to shut your mouth, listen up, and do whatever your host parents, exchange program coordinator, or school teachers are telling you to do.

Anyone who goes on exchange with a “you’re not the boss of me” attitude is wasting his or her time and the time of many others.

Resilience

Doing difficult things is a key part of the exchange student lifestyle.

Nearly every student reaches a point during his or her second or third month of being on exchange where everything seems too difficult. The novelty of being on exchange has worn off. He or she may be experiencing homesickness. The language barrier is still there and is proving frustratingly slow to go away.

One morning, the student wakes up and can’t face the thought of getting on the train to go to school again, and making conversation with his or her classmates again, and spending yet another day trying to understand, and converse in, a foreign language.

He or she simply has to get going and start doing those difficult things for another day, and the day after that, and each day after that for several months. Things do get easier, but there will be times when nothing seems easy and when things in fact seem to be getting harder. You need a resilient, tough personality to endure those times.

Autonomy

Although foreign exchange students have a support network in the form of their host families, exchange programs, schools and fellow exchange students, they also need to be independent.

Particularly at the start of an exchange year, students will have fewer friends and friendly school mates, and will need to be self-reliant until they find their feet.

Tact (not being offensive)

You need to be tactful when you’re spending an extended amount of time in a foreign country.

There are bound to be things about your host country and its population that you find strange, or annoying, or far inferior to the same thing in your home country.

Your host families may also have habits or ways of doing things that you find silly or odd. You need to be tactful enough to accept these things and not make a big deal out of them.

Anyone who goes to, say, New Zealand and spends a lot of time commenting negatively on the New Zealand school system or the New Zealand climate or moaning about New Zealanders themselves is not going to make friends with many people.

You need to accept your host country as it is – an imperfect place with good and bad points, and imperfect people who also have good and bad points – and get on with things, without dwelling on the negatives.

Sobriety

Don’t go on exchange if you are a heavy drinker or into any kind of drugs.

The fact is that narcotics change your personality – usually for the worse. They also can make you careless and prone to acting immaturely.

Both your reputation and your time on exchange will fare better if you are able to limit your consumption of narcotics to a drink or two with your host siblings or close school friends, where you are legally able to.

Even better, you can follow the examples of rock musicians James Hetfield (Metallica) and Ted Nugent – who follow the straight edge  philosophy – for the duration of your exchange, and abstain from cigarettes, drugs and alcohol altogether. In any case, make sure you stay sober and in control at all times.

Work-arounds

There are other characteristics and skills which either are not essential for foreign exchange students, or which you can compensate for if you don’t have them:

• Language aptitude – When it comes to foreign languages, not everyone is blessed with talent for  retaining vocabulary, or pronouncing words. Generally speaking, you can compensate for this weakness by working harder – for example, by rote learning more vocabulary, or by getting a really good handle on grammar (which hardly anyone does well).
• Academic talent – Foreign exchange students usually have a fair bit of latitude in the subjects they’re allowed to take at their host schools. If you aren’t the world’s best student, you can usually arrange your school timetable to incorporate more of the subjects you’re good at or interested in.
• Homesickness – Not everyone has a personality which lets them live away from their home and families without getting homesick. It is very difficult to eliminate homesickness altogether. However, there is a trick for living with it: minimise contact with your family and friends at home. Keep your contact with them brief and contained – for example, a one-hour chat with your parents each weekend – and ask them not to message or call you at other times. The more you practise going without your family and friends from home, the better you’ll get at it.
• Being outgoing – Even if you’re not a naturally outgoing person, you can still make plenty of friends and meet new people by doing two “mechanical” things consistently. The first is spending as much time as possible with other people – at school, with your host family, and by accepting invitations. Try consciously to surround yourself with other people as often as possible. Then, make conversation with those people using the “stack” of getting to know you questions I discussed in my post on giving a good first impression. You’ll come across as an outgoing, natural conversationalist, when in fact all you’ll be doing is going through a practised routine.

If you can think of any other characteristics that foreign exchange students do or don’t need to succeed, please leave a comment below.

Good luck,

Matt

There are dozens of exchange programs. In fact, there are probably hundreds if you count small exchange arrangements between schools, partner cities arrangements, and so forth. I have listed a number of the major exchange programs on the ‘Resources’ page.

Choosing the right exchange program can make a huge difference to the success or otherwise of your student exchange. Yet, the process which most students and their families employ to select a program seems incredibly casual. I surmise that most people just find a program that looks OK and allows them to exchange to the country they are interested in, and apply to that program. They seem to do very little research or critical thinking prior to applying. In fact, they probably put more critical thought into their choice of sneakers or cell phone.

Don’t be like them. Increase your chances of having a great exchange by putting some rigour into the process of selecting an exchange program.

Do-it-yourself assessment tool

The aim of this article is to help you select the best available exchange program.  I only have direct experience with one exchange student program – Rotary Youth Exchange. I thought that it was a well-run and organized program. However, there may well be other programs which are better organized, or which better suit your purposes.

An in-depth examination of all available exchange programs is beyond the scope of this website. I also do not intend to make a recommendation in this article about which program is the “best”. Instead, I will help you make your own assessment of which program is right for your circumstances. I will give you five rules to apply when assessing exchange programs. You should only select a program which meets all five of those rules.

Rule 1: The exchange program must have one or more mentors or counsellors to help exchange students having difficulties

Things can and do go wrong during student exchanges. You need to choose an exchange organisation which gives you a safety net. In fact, ideally you’ll have several safety nets. The more the better.

Usually, when an exchange student encounters a problem, he gets help from his host family in the first instance. That works OK, until the exchange student’s host family is the problem. Thankfully, I never had issues with any of my host families. But a number of my exchange colleagues had problems with theirs. Some of these problems were mildly humorous, like only being permitted to shower at home twice per week. Some were potentially dangerous, like physical abuse of a host sibling.

Rotary had a mechanism in place for dealing with such issues. It appointed two “counsellors” for each student – one in the host Rotary club, and one in the sponsoring Rotary club back home. This meant that if a student was having problems with his host family, he could approach either Rotary counsellor for help. If the counsellor in the host Rotary club wasn’t helpful, or felt conflicted because he was friends with the host family in question, the student could contact the counsellor in his sponsoring Rotary club. The sponsor club counsellor would then sort things out. I thought it was a smart system.

I’m aware of other exchange organizations which have a co-ordinator or mentor for all students in a particular city or district. Students who have problems that their host families can’t solve can turn to the co-ordinator or mentor person for assistance. That also seems sensible, although I wonder what happens if the co-ordinator hears about the problem and sides with the host family, whom the co-ordinator most likely will have recruited. A two safety-net system like Rotary’s is preferable.

Rule 2: The exchange program must be large and well-established

Size matters when it comes to exchange programs. The larger exchange organisations such as Rotary, AFS and YFU have been operating for decades and have probably each sent hundreds of thousands of students on exchange. All of that experience is reflected in their policies and administration, which are well-settled and robust. They are large enough to be able to employ full-time staff who can devote their time to looking after students and running their programs properly. If a student has a problem with his or her host family and needs to change – which happens relatively often – a large program will have the resources and capabilities to find a new host family quickly.

Smaller exchange programs – such as an arrangement between two schools in different countries – are unlikely to have the same amount of rigour. They largely rely upon volunteer labour and may struggle to find you a new family if things with your original host family go wrong.

Unless you find a small exchange program or arrangement which seems exceptionally well run, stick with one of the larger, established programs.

Rule 3: The exchange program must rigorously screen all host families and program administrators

Before you apply to any youth exchange organisation, be sure to check out its policies in relation to screening host families and program administrators.

At a minimum, the exchange organisation you choose should undertake police background checks on your host family or host families. It should also undertake such checks on any of its employees or officers who will have supervisory responsibilities towards you. Youth exchange students in a foreign country are young, vulnerable and very attractive targets for fraudsters, paedophiles, and others wanting to exploit them.

The exchange organisation should also interview and screen host families to ensure that they will offer you a good, stable home life. A girl from my high school went on exchange when she was 16 years old and was placed in a family where the father was a movie director. Anecdotally, there were always assorted movie and television stars, musicians and other celebrities hanging around the host family’s house. While she was on exchange, the girl ended up getting engaged to a hip-hop star who paid for her to have breast augmentation surgery. That was an unfortunate example of a young person being placed with a host family which couldn’t offer her a suitable home environment.

Rule 4: The exchange program must have a local office or representative

Make sure that the exchange program you choose has a local office or contact person in your home country.

It sounds like a small thing. However, virtually everything about your exchange program will be easier if you and your parents can deal with a person locally, instead of having to deal with people overseas. Applying for the program will be easier. Sorting out problems with your host families will be easier. Things like insurance claims will be far easier. There will be no language barrier and no time zone differences to worry about. If anything comes up during your exchange, your parents can just call the local person and let him sort things out with his overseas counterpart.

Rule 5: The exchange organisation must give you opportunities to socialise with other exchange students

On a lighter note, I recommend seeking out an exchange program which will give you opportunities to meet, and socialise with, other inbound exchange students.

Most exchange organisations really push the need for exchange students to spend the majority of their time associating with their host families, school mates and other natives of their host countries. I agree with that policy.

However, good exchange organisations also recognise that relationships between exchange students can be hugely beneficial, and encourage those relationships. During my exchange year in Switzerland, Rotary Switzerland did this by organising a two-week long European tour for all inbound exchange students, as well as weekend get-togethers every two months. Meeting other exchange students through these events helped me in the following ways:

• Coming from the Southern Hemisphere, my exchange year started in January. There were a number of Northern Hemisphere students who had started their exchange years in the previous August. Those more experienced exchange students gave me a lot of good advice about what they had learned and really helped me find my feet in the early days of my exchange.
• The other exchange students could relate to issues and frustrations I was experiencing with school, Swiss culture, language, homesickness, and were happy to discuss those.
• I was able to meet and befriend the host families of several other exchange students, broadening my experience of Swiss life.
• I had a circle of friends to spend time with on weekends when my host families were busy.
• I enjoyed being able to travel with others who were experiencing things for the first time at the same time I was.
• I was able to learn something about the cultures of the countries from which those other exchange students came.

I am still close friends with roughly half a dozen people I first met when we were exchange students in Switzerland. Although we have moved on and developed other common interests since then, the help, friendship and support we gave each other all those years ago is still the glue which binds our friendships together now.

Don’t miss out on the many benefits of spending time with other exchange students. Be sure to apply to an exchange program which will enable you to meet, and travel with, other exchange students.

Good luck,

Matt