During a Rotary Club meeting at the Roger Sherman Inn on Feb. 11, Caileigh Murray, a 17-year old junior at New Canaan High School, spoke about her experiences in the Rotary Youth Exchange program in Spain.
Murray lived with a sponsor family in Cobena, Spain, outside of Madrid for four weeks. Highlighting her time overseas, Murray visited landmarks including Granada, Puerta del Sol in Madrid, Palacio de las Cortes de España, which is home to the Congress of Deputies of Spain, and Royal Palace of Madrid.
She immersed herself in Spanish culture like flamenco dancing, modern art at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, which is Spain’s national museum of 20th-century art, and yes, she even ate at a Spanish McDonald’s.
Murray says she had to make adjustments in a new country, such as when she ate her meals, “We ate breakfast around 10 or 11 a.m., lunch would be from 2-3 p.m. and dinner was around 10 p.m.”
“It was a wonderful country (Spain),” she said. “I had so much fun enjoying Spanish history and all of the food,” she said, “Especially the food,” she joked.
The program
The Rotary Youth Exchange program gives New Canaan students the opportunity to study abroad with both the short-term and long-term exchange, and it also gives families here a chance to host a student from a foreign country.
In the short-term exchange, which Murray participated in, Rotary International acts like a match-maker. In addition to filling out an application, students provide a list of three different countries they want to go to. Then they are matched with a family. From there, the student can accept. His or her family is responsible for travel arrangements and costs.
For Murray, she was matched with Spain, her first choice. Her exchange sister, Sandra, arrived in the United States in June and Murray’s family hosted Sandra for four weeks, then the girls traveled together to Spain, where Sandra’s family hosted Murray for four weeks.
The long-term exchange is a 10-month program where a student lives with three different families here in the states, or abroad. The student lives with three families for about 14 weeks each. With the first family, the student celebrates Thanksgiving before they move on to the next family. The student stays with the second family through the holidays and then moves on to the third family around Easter.
The process for both long-term and short-term exchange programs for the 2017-2018 school year will begin in the fall with application deadlines before Thanksgiving.
Learn to be open-minded
Rikke Sten Holst, 17, is from Denmark and a participant in the long-term exchange program who also was at the Feb. 11 Rotary meeting here. She is currently living here with a New Canaan family. She said, “You learn to be open-minded; I do many things differently than (host families), but I try to do as they do.”
Ann Cheney, youth exchange officer for the Rotary Club of New Canaan, explained a benefit of the program: “We have a young student from another country, who comes to another country (U.S.). We get to learn about their culture and they get to learn about our culture.”
Cheney told the Advertiser, “We are currently taking names under consideration for hosting our in-bound student for the 2016-2017 school year. It’s a wonderful opportunity for families to see the world through the eyes of an exchange student.” She said, “What we ask is that the families provide a warm, loving and supportive home for the student while they are in their care.”
“The goal is to provide an American experience through the hospitality of three different families,” Cheney said.
To learn more about traveling to Europe or being a host family, check out www.rotary.org/en/youth-exchanges.
Also, contact Ann Cheney at ann@stewartsmarket.com.
Rikke Sten Holst, left, and Caileigh Murray at the Roger Sherman Inn, Feb. 11. — Rich Durazzo, Jr. photo
The post Rotary provides youths opportunity to learn overseas appeared first on New Canaan Advertiser.