Exchange students report shocking placements

"I have never seen anything that dirty my entire life, says Espen Hansen, in an interview with Aftenposten. He is a former exchange student to the U.S. in 2007, and still remembers the smell of dirt, garbage and a clogged toilet when he arrived at his host family’s house in Minnesota.

Hansen is one of many exchange students who have reported poor living conditions and treatment from the host family during their exchange with EF High School Year in the U.S. Students have also reported little or no support from the organization and its local coordinators.

Every year, approximately 1,300 Norwegian 16-year-olds get funding from the Norwegian State Educational Loan Fund to do a year of high school abroad. When the students arrive in the U.S., an American partner organization often assumes responsibility for the student, finds the student’s host family and is supposed to provide support during their year abroad.

However, after the financial crisis, more students come to the U.S. than the organizations are capable of finding host families for. Some organizations pay their local coordinators for each new host family they recruit, and as a result coordinators often pay friends and families – illegally - to take in students.

- I’ve seen many things I don’t like, including students that had been sexually abused, photographed, and forced to drink alcohol, says Danielle Grijalva, She is the head of CSFES, an organization that helps exchange students who run into problems abroad. Only this past year, 10-12 Norwegian exchange students abroad contacted her for help.

EF is the largest students exchange organization in Norway, but National Director Morten Davidsen denies that they have some sort of negative stamp. "Our job is to give the students the ‘best time of your life’, and that’s what we work towards every day," he says. "

However, Davidsen admits that there may be problems with how the partner organizations are run in the U.S. "As of this year we are cutting our partnership with the organizations in the U.S., and will manage the entire process ourselves," Daivdsen tells Aftenposten.

(Aftenposten)