The College of Charleston English Language Institute (ELI) hosted a professor, Kayoko Takegoshi, from Japan’s Toyama University during the fall of 2014. She met our students and faculty, attended our ESL classes, toured the campus and city, and returned to her home university to arrange a “CofC ELI short term program” for her sophomore students. She anticipates that 4-5 students will be interested in attending the English Language Institute from August 24 – September 25, 2015. This is a summer break for Toyama University students, so it is the only opportunity for them to study abroad. As student housing is at a premium, especially at the beginning of the academic year, it’s not possible to lodge these students in the CofC dorm.

Therefore, the CofC ELI program has launched a homestay program and is in the early stages of recruiting individuals, couples and families who would be interested in hosting a Japanese student for 5 weeks. For families with young children, this can be a life altering experience as children of all ages benefit from interacting with people from other cultures, and through this process, learn tolerance and other essential qualities of becoming global citizens.

These students are university sophomores and are independent adults. Ideally, the homes would be within walking or biking distance from the CofC campus so they could come and go on their own. Students attend ELI classes M-F from 8am-3pm, depending on the day, so they would purchase a meal plan to cover breakfasts and lunches. Dinner would be prepared at home. Host families would be adequately compensated for hosting a student, and would be expected to include the student on any appropriate family excursions during the weekends. As English language acquisition is a primary goal of the students, involving them in English conversation in the family setting would be strongly encouraged.

If you are interested in learning more about the CofC homestay program, please contact Alice Hamilton at hamiltonam1@cofc.edu by April 20, 2015.