It all started with a small advertisement in the church bulletin. The title read: “Host families needed for exchange students.” We talked about the ad briefly and our children were adamant that I call the number to get more information. As it was already late in July, we assumed the need was for the following school year. To our surprise, there was an urgent need for families for the upcoming school year.At the coordinators encouragement, we agreed to proceed with the evaluation process, with the understanding that we could stop the process at any time. While we went through the process of being approved (steps like a home evaluation, background check and interview), we studied the website of potential students. Potential exchange students create a biography for host families to review. The biography includes background information such as age, year in school, family size, hometown, interests and hobbies, and languages spoken. They include photos and a letter about themselves and their hopes for their year abroad. Our son (16 at the time) scoured the biographies for “hot” girls. Our daughter always wanted a sister, so her only request was for a girl. My husband’s family had hosted exchange students in his teenage years so he had a more stringent list of requirements.
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