Rotary Youth Exchange Programs

Learn More about This Year's Exchange Students

Each year the Rotary Youth Exchange Program provides thousands of young people with the opportunity to experience the cultures and accomplishments of people in other countries. Rotary Youth Exchange provides for the selection and sponsorship of secondary school students in the 16-18 year age group to travel to another country. Students usually spend a full academic year abroad, attending school and living with host families in other countries; although some clubs and districts sponsor short-term exchanges. While overseas, the student is under the care and direction of a host Rotary Club, which arranges accommodations with host families, schooling, and other matters. A counselor from the host Rotary Club is responsible for the student for the period of the exchange.

Rotary Youth Exchange is one of Rotary's most popular programs for promoting international understanding and developing lifelong friendships. The value of Youth Exchange is experienced not only by the high school-age students involved, but also by the host families, sponsoring clubs, receiving high schools and the entire community. Youth Exchange participants usually provide their fellow students in their host schools with excellent and rich opportunities to learn about customs, languages, traditions and family life in other countries and to see other parts of the world.

How Our Exchange Works
As a Rotary Youth Exchange student, you will spend a year living in another country, usually with three or four host families. You will become part of those families and their community. These Rotary families are unpaid volunteers who will welcome and care for you, supervise your year and introduce you to their country.

In your host country you may learn another language. You will try different cuisines, study new subjects, enjoy a new culture and discover a new way of living. In addition you will learn a great deal about yourself and gain confidence and self-sufficiency. You will attend school in your local community, as well as participating in Rotary activities and often civic functions. At the same time you will be making new friends, seeing exciting places and experiencing adventures that will take a lifetime to recount.

Selection Process

An application of interest should be made to the Rotary Club of Weston. The club will interview interested students and select candidates to be presented to the District Committee. This committee's role is to select exchanges, organize and administer the international exchanges. Final selection is dependent on, among other things, a District interview.

The country of destination is decided by the committee in consultation with the student and depending on the availability of exchange in the preferred locality. Further seminars, home visits and briefing weekends are all part of the continuing Rotary involvement in your preparations. Your family is also involved all the way and during your year's exchange they will be provided with continuing support and information.

Objectives

To further international goodwill and understanding by enabling students to study at first hand some of the culture and accomplishments of people in lands other than their own.

To enable students to advance their education by studying for a year in an environment entirely different from their own and by undertaking study of courses and subjects not normally available to them in secondary schools of their own country.

To act as ambassadors for their own country by addressing Rotary Clubs, community organizations, and youth groups in their host country, and by imparting as much knowledge as they can of their own country and its culture to the people they meet during their year abroad.To study and observe all facets of life and culture in the country where they are hosted so that on return to their own country they can pass on the knowledge they have gained by addressing Rotary Clubs, youth groups, and community organizations.

Hosting a Rotary Youth Exchange Student

Hosting a Youth Exchange student from another country is a challenge and an opportunity. Involvement with an exchange student challenges a host family to become familiar with another culture, while providing the opportunity to share a young student=s hopes and ambitions. These challenges and opportunities promise to enrich the lives of every member of your family.< /FONT>

The Rotary Club of Weston is always eager to find host families. If you are located in the area of Weston, whether a member of your family is a Rotarian or not, and you are interested in becoming a host family, please call or email the Youth Exchange Officerof the Rotary Club of Weston  -Joe Altschul  at 954-356-001.

Potential host families will be interviewed by representatives of the Rotary District and the host Rotary Club as part of the selection process, to help assure a rewarding experience for the exchange student and for the host family.

You will be expected to provide parental guidance and supervision for the student as well as room and board during his or her stay in your home. To facilitate the student's assimilation into the culture and to allow more families in the community to participate in the Youth Exchange experience, long-term exchange students usually stay with three or four families, for three to four months each, during the year of their visit.

What Types of Families Open Their Doors to Rotary Youth Exchange?

All types. Rotarian and non-Rotarian families -- with young children, grown children or no children at all. All it takes is the willingness to care and a heart that is ready for a touch of adventure.

Just as there is no perfect exchange student, there is no perfect host home. Each young person who comes to us from abroad is an individual; each family is unique. But just as there are certain criteria which make it more likely that a student will be a good exchange student, there are certain criteria which make a family more likely to provide a unenjoyable and beneficial experience for the student.

Warmth: an easy affection within the family and respect for all members by each other

Breadth of interests: a real curiosity about things outside the home - not necessarily busy or extremely intellectual, for many students will fit into a more quiet and simple atmosphere better

Flexibility: the family must be secure and confident enough to be able to adapt their rules to make for room for individuals

Humor: a laugh often brings perspective to a problem that might otherwise appear to assume undue proportions

Motivation: the family must be realistic about why they want to host an Exchange Student in their home; not because they think it is something they should do; not as a solution to the family's own domestic problems; not out of desire for prestige or social acceptance - all members of the host family must want to participate; one uncooperative family member can make for an unhappy experience for all involved

Health: if there is a serious emotional or physical problem in the family, the extra strain of adjusting to a long-term guest can make for a difficult situation

Space: the student must have a bed of his or her own; if a room is to be shared, it should be with a child of the same sex and of similar age

Transportation: the student may not drive, so the family must be willing and able to see that he or she gets to school and various other activities with reasonable convenience

Religion: differences in religion are rarely a problem, but the family must be prepared to respect beliefs of others and not to require participation by the exchange student in their own church or religious life

Chores: the exchange student should not be treated as a special guest - the value of the program is the acceptance by both students and hosts that the student will be one of the family and not receive any special attention -- it is expected that the exchange student will perform chores as do the other children in the family

Please take the time to learn more about the Rotary Youth Exchange program by calling or emailing the Youth Exchange Officer of the Rotary Club of Weston -  Joe Altschul at 954-356-0011.