Home Stay

The Nikkei Youth Cultural Heritage Program (NYCHP) is a program of the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Northern California (JCCCNC). The NYCHP was created to allow college aged students to immerse themselves in Japanese culture through a month-long intensive language and homestay program in Kobe, Japan. The NYCHP is made possible with support from the The Henri and Tomoye Takahashi Charitable Foundation, the Hatsuro and Amey Aizawa Family Charitable Trust, Japan Airlines, Kintetsu International, and in partnership with the Kobe YMCA, JACCC (LA), JCCH (Honolulu) and JCCCW (Seattle). – created at http://animoto.com

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Jo and I had the opportunity this past weekend to participate in a Korean Homestay. This program introduces you to a traditional Korean village, food, and home. We had a great experience!

For more information:
http://homestaykorea.com

Music, used with permission from Jason Shaw:
http://youtube.com/audionautix

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Vancouver English Centre offers: Grammar, Communication, Business English, TOEFL, TOEIC, and IELTS courses in Vancouver, Canada. Our carefully managed homestay program ensures complete English immersion.

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Room Rentals in Toronto can be hard to find… if you want clean affordable spaces close to downtown!

Coming to the wonderful city of Toronto is exciting…especially if you have a great place to lay your head at night. Homes Abroad International can help with your room rental needs

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So right now I’m an exchange student in Ecuador, and I need some help getting my friend to the US to do a cultural exchange. I was fortunate enough to have parents with enough money to get me into AFS, but the people here don’t tend to have 9000 dollars just lying around. No program I have found offers any sort of financial aid for kids in latin america wanting to study in the US (we talked to AFS, very frustrating) and they all seem to be in the about 9000 dollar price range for a year homestay program. I was wondering I guess how hard it would be to just set up an exchange where he comes to my town and goes to my school without a program. Also, if anyone could recommend a cheaper program, I do have some ideas about fund raising.
The main thing I see as being an issue is getting a visa. Does anyone have any experience with that? I don’t think getting him into the school would be that hard, we have other exchange students and I already asked one of the councilors and they said it wouldn’t be impossible.
Well, anything helps, advise, experience, legal expertes…
Thanks!
I’m talking about high school by te way. I’m a high school exchange student and my friend wants to be too.

Whoa!

While this sounds like an absolutely wonderful idea — there are huge problems here (regardless of the advice below).

First, a visa is REQUIRED for your friend to attend school in the US. He cannot just come as a "tourist". If he goes through a CSIET listed program (such as AFS) those are fairly easy to obtain. That is a J1 visa. However, if he tries to come on his own, he needs an F1 visa. Much more difficult PLUS they have to have proof they can support themselves while they are here (I think that’s proof of $25,000).

Second, your school may not accept an exchange student who is NOT here through a program. They don’t want the hassle. In fact MOST schools won’t. They have to go through a lot of hoops just to be able to accept a student with an F1 visa. When you spoke to the counselor, did you happen to mention your friend would NOT come through a program? You may get lucky on this if you happen to live in a large city or an area that has a large International population for another reason — a university, business, etc. Then it’s possible your high school has a set up for it. BTW: If your school DOES accept this sort of exchange student, generally they will charge tuition!

Truly an exchange program IS the best way to do this — and generally cheaper in the long run. You might look into Rotary Exchange. It’s much more need based than AFS. Your friend would still have to come up with SOME funding but a much more reasonable amount.

Here’s the website for that: http://www.rotary.org/en/StudentsAndYouth/youthprograms/RotaryYouthExchange/Pages/ridefault.aspx

Good luck!

Created for the Homestay program of SD#35 in Langley, British Columbia.

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Vancouver English Centre offers: Grammar, Communication, Business English, TOEFL, TOEIC, and IELTS courses in Vancouver, Canada. Our carefully managed homestay program ensures complete English immersion.

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My older host brother from the Makki family. There’s two takes, included both just for kicks and giggles. He was really cool and really nice =]

In the second take you can see my younger host brother Yoshinori. He was SO GENEROUS to share his room with me for three months, so ultimate thanks to him!

I also had a host sister, but she is not in the video! She was also very cool =]

Basically what he says is that he’s a 2nd year student in college, I’m doing a homestay program with them, and it’s his YouTube debut. Oh, and that he lives in Osaka.

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Vancouver English Centre offers: Grammar, Communication, Business English, TOEFL, TOEIC, and IELTS courses in Vancouver, Canada. Our carefully managed homestay program ensures complete English immersion.

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4th Annual ‘The Japan Experience!’ cultural immersion home stay program for junior high and high school students.

Students come from all over the world to experience a Japanese high school, to participate in language and cultural lessons, to explore Tokyo and to stay with a Japanese family.

Location: Tokyo, Japan
Host school: Seiritsu Gakuen High School
Dates: July 30 to August 8, 2010
Maximum number of participants: 10

Registration deadline: June 15, 2010

For more information & to register, go to the Seiritsu English website:
www.seiritsu-int.com

Cultural lessons include: manga, Japanese language, tea ceremony, karate, kendo, Japanese cooking, Japanese art, Japanese calligraphy, taiko drumming and more!

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