School exchange trip - is this normal

[nancy75]

My Dd (age 13) is going on a Spanish exchange trip with her school. The Spanish child is coming to stay with us in November & Dd is going the in March.
Bearing in mind today is the 17th October is it normal for the school to not know when the Spanish kids are coming?
I have called today & they seem to think I’m unreasonable for wanting to know when the child is going to arrive!
I am also a little bit concerned that they have asked nothing at all about us, I had expected that there would be some kind of vetting of the families that had children staying

Yes it is odd and unorganised. We’re doing virtually the same time frame (student comes here 1st December and we’re (all hosting parents) going through the DBS process now. Not sure why your school hasn’t mentioned that as it’s quite a major safeguarding issue.

Presumably the other school is arranging travel but they must know approximately. However ime the dates are fixed a few months ahead and activities booked.

DS did a Taiwanese exchange a couple of years ago when he was 14. The boy from Taiwan came to us first. There was no vetting done and we received some basic information about his family/interests a week or so before his arrival but it was all in Mandarin. DS had actually stopped taking Mandarin at that point and never got round to getting it translated so we were in the dark until we met the exchange student at the airport.

It all went well, though.

We did send similar information about us to the exchange student before he arrived- e.g. the fact that we had a dog in case he were allergic or scared of dogs.

Judashascomeintosomemoney interesting that you have to do a dbs & it seems some other schools don’t.
If this child is arriving in November I think they have left it too late to get the dbs’ back in time ( it’s not a huge problem for me because DH & I both have checks for our jobs but I’m sure not all parents do!)

We have done exchanges through school in the past and all adults in the house had to have a DBS sorted out a couple of months before the guests arrived. We were given details well in advance and there was plenty of communication between the teenagers on Snapchat etc. I think we were given approximate travel plans months in advance with some minor changes a few weeks before travel.

In your situation I would ask when you will be given the information as you have other things to arrange for November. It sounds badly organised. Is it something that the school has just started doing?

They do this exchange with the same school every year - you’d think they would have it sorted by now.
We were a bit reluctant to let her go at first (she’s a bit of a dolly daydream & DH is a massive worrier) I’m usually quite laid back about stuff but the lack of organisation is starting to make me worry about her going to another country with this school

Dbs took only about a week through school.

Thanks LIZS, that’s good to know, my dbs check through work took about 3 weeks so if they can be done faster there’s still hope that they will be done!

I am sure she will be fine and have a wonderful experience. Just make sure that before she goes you all have a copy of the itinerary, addresses, contact numbers for the teacher/travel company/ Spanish family. If she is already in contact with the Spanish boy/girl I would ask for all forms of communication that are used as lots of teenagers don't seem to bother with text any more! Also I would make sure that she has plenty of data for her phone so that she knows she can look up anything she needs when she is away.

hellojim thank you

I just heard back from the school - they don't do any kind of vetting, which has surprised me slightly, the teacher said they have been running the trip for 20 years and never had a problem.

I know DD will be fine but the lack of organisation has rattled me a bit!

My DD went on her French Exchange this year, no DBS check or equivalent. The teacher's line was very much, if the other family trust you with their child, then you should trust them with yours. We were all happy with that.
On the other hand, it would have been really odd if they hadn't given us the dates by this stage!

Do you know anyone else who is doing the exchange. If the school is being so unresponsive it might help if another parent or 2 phoned in to query what's happening!

The teacher told me she thinks they are coming end of Nov /start of Dec & there will be a meeting after half term to confirm dates - in the meantime I'll just look out for a poor Spanish kid turning up on my doorstep!