EDUCATION
Global affairs Foreign exchange students at MHS prove it’s a small world after all
BY JEFF CHEW
M
ARICOPA MOM NICOLE POLK has one daughter at home and an extended family of daughters around the world.
Since 2018, she, husband Stephen McElhose and daughter Katie have hosted high school students from Switzerland, Spain, Italy and Kenya. This school year, they are hosting Elsa Hedén from Sweden, who is spending her senior year at Maricopa High School. It’s become a family tradition for the Hedéns. Elsa’s mother, Charlotta, was once a foreign exchange student stateside. Polk explained how her family was drawn to hosting exchange students. “My daughter really wanted an older sister and since science has proven that’s not an option, we decided to host,” said Polk, an international coordinator with the San Francisco-based Aspect Foundation. Katie, an eighth grader at Legacy Traditional School, “feels like she has sisters from all over the world,” Polk said. Polk works for Aspect in Maricopa, finding and recruiting host families, and placing them with foreign exchange students in their senior year. In her role, she is a bit of a matchmaker, finding the right family for the right exchange student. It all starts when families abroad complete an online form and Aspect runs a background check. Questions asked of families and exchange students cover everything from religion to food allergies. “I help get families through the background application process,” Polk said. Finding the right family-exchange student chemistry is an important step. “It’s for a whole school year so there are a lot of emotional rollercoasters,” Polk said. Polk recalled their first experience with an exchange student. “The first time, we were really nervous and we didn’t know what to expect,” she said. “But there is so much you can learn from a teenager in your home. We have loved the variety of personalities.” Foreign exchange students become fully
Local mom Nicole Polk (right) and daughter Katie (middle) welcome Swedish foreign exchange student Elsa Hedén to Maricopa. Hedén, from Stockholm, will spend her senior year at Maricopa High School.
InMaricopa.com | February 2024
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