7/9/2007 - Exchange students say experience changed them for the better
by Sarah Owen
The Northwestern
She’d seen the overalls, the baby clothes, knew that OshKosh B’Gosh was huge worldwide.
But growing up in Indonesia, Diandra Sabrina had no idea Oshkosh was a real city – let alone that she’d be spending nine months living here, attending Oshkosh North High School and immersing herself in all that is American culture.
“I had expectations before coming here,” the 18-year-old American Field Study exchange student said in near-perfect English as she sat with friend and fellow AFS student, French-born Camille Prat, inside New Moon Cafe in late May.
“Like what you see in the movies, like there’s a Starbucks everywhere, coffee shops, public transportation, subways,” Sabrina said. Both girls exchanged glances and giggles.
“More like New York,” chimed 18-year-old Prat, who spent her 2006-07 school year at Oshkosh West High School. “You have these stereotypes, really expectations. It was a good culture shock.”
And not just because Oshkosh doesn’t boast a subway system or Starbucks on every street corner.
Along with uprooting themselves from life in their home countries, schools where uniforms are a must and there are no sports teams, the girls had to learn English while searching for a deeper understanding of American culture.
“Here, (high school) is part of your life,” Prat said.
Indeed, both students became active in their respective host schools’ programs and in the local community, recently volunteering at the weekly Waterfest events at the Leach Amphitheater. Though there were ups and downs when it came to being homesick, Prat and Sabrina say they have no regrets about studying abroad, even though they’ll have to repeat their senior year once back home.
“It’s really like they become your family,” Prat said of her host parents, Kathleen and Jeffrey Rasmussen.
Like any American students, the girls quickly became accustomed to the life of a typical Oshkosh student.
“MySpace,” Sabrina said. “It’s one of the most-haved things here besides iPods.”
There are various organizations worldwide that send exchange and study abroad students around the world each year. AFS’s Oshkosh chapter recently sent high school students to Spain, Japan, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium.
Mary Ann Offer, Oshkosh AFS chapter coordinator and host-mom to Diandra Sabrina, said all three of her children have studied abroad, and it changed their lives.
“As a teenager, to do something that can make a difference in the world in terms of helping people from different cultures understand each other better … it’s really empowering,” Offer said.
Along with a deeper understanding of another culture, learning a foreign language and even gaining self-confidence, students who go abroad come back somehow grown, they say.
“It makes you more mature. Like, this kid I know got back from Japan, and he said he changed from a boy to a man,” Sabrina said. “When we come back, we will be women.”
Added Prat with a laugh, “And we gained weight. Yeah, we gained maturity and weight.”
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