Foreign Exchange Trips

[PJsallday123]

In the 90s (maybe later?) it was completely normal for 14-16 year olds to have arranged foreign exchange stays with students in other European countries where you travelled together from your school to that country and then were shipped off to individual families for your “stay” in their home.
In a country where you had never met these people before, spoke limited amounts of their language and no one was ever DBS checked. Looking back now AIBU that this was ever ok??
Its one of those things that of anyone ever suggested it now it would be veto’d at the first mention!

my daughter did it in year 9, when she was 14, so about 7 years ago. She loved it and said it was the best school trip she ever did. Sadly they probably don't do them at all now.

My daughter went to Franve this year in Year 8. We had to have a DBS check to host the girl and they had an equivalent in France. She had a fantastic time and the girl was so lovely. It was a fantastic experience for her and her French is so much better.

They were brilliant for language and personaldevelopment. Far too much Molly coddling of teens these days. We arranged a private one with a friend of a friend when girls in year 8 it was excellent. Dd did so well and came back noticeably more grown up
and confident.

They still happen today. There is perhaps more rules around them but they still happen.

My DC did one this year. We were DBS checked, however it is worth noting that the DBS was only set up in 2012 so you wouldn’t have been able to get a DBS check in the 90s.

Some schools do still do them now, albeit only aware of private schools doing them. I went on one when I was Year 8. It wasn’t the easiest fortnight of my life ( her parents spoke no English at all) but it was definitely good for me and stopping me speaking French like I’d time travelled from the 1960s- so much of what you got taught at school was very out of date. The next year her parents got an English speaking friend to call my parents and ask if we’d like to do it again in the holidays. My parents put me on the ferry and her parents picked me up the other side. Then she came back with me and my parents sent her back on the ferry at the end. I remember we played a lot of crazy golf and ate a lot of pizza.

I loved my French exchange trip. I learnt so much, and wrote to my "exchangee" for years. It's such a shame that they don't happen any more.

Also they are 14 / 15 not 4. As long as your child is confident and capable if they get there and it’s dodgy or they feel unsafe they can just leave.

You definitely could get a check in the 90's, but it was called a CRB rather than a DBS, I had to have one to start my uni course in 1998.

I remember my brother doing one and us having a French student to stay, I think he was about 12/13 at the time. I was 9 and he tried to greet me with a kiss on each cheek, I was horrified 😂
I didn't do one, and was glad, my brother hated it

My DD's sixth form college had students over for an exchange only last week. She's in year thirteen so they are turning eighteen this year. The uk students went to France in the summer term. Most would have been seventeen but some could have been sixteen.

This still happens at my DC's school. DC1 went to France in year 8, DC2 went to Spain in year 10, DC3 went to Belgium in year 9 (last year), and we've hosted the exchanges back here too of course. They've all been great. DC3 has signed up for another one next year.

It's a state school btw, not a private school, but it does have a very active language department.

My kids have done them with their sports team. The coaches etc go through so many safeguarding checks in order to coach, they're not allowed to offer a child a lift home etc. but a coach full of 11-16 year old French kids arrive and get waved off with any family without a backward glance!

I did my first school exchange in 1973 to Rennes. Yes, it was exactly as you described. Coach overnight, ferry and then arrival at exchange school, where we met our exchange partners and then went off with them. It was fine.
Did a second exchange to Hildesheim in 1975, same thing and had an even better time.
Went off with a friend from my course at university in 1979 on our year abroad. We didn't have anywhere to live, had to arrange that on arrival. No mobiles or internet or anything other than letters and phone boxes. It was considered normal back then.

What shool are these trips still happening in? (Private? ) My kids state schools have never done this!

Our state school still does them. My yr9 child had a letter for a French exchange last week for the exchange to take place next year. They also do Spanish and German exchanges and a sports exchange. We're in Wiltshire.

I did 3 when I was at school in the 80s; two to France and one to Germany. I kept in touch with my exchange partners for several years afterwards.

When we went we mostly had no idea who we were staying with until we got there. On one trip we got to write to our partner before the trip but had no idea what they looked like or who their parents were.

Great experiences and I learnt so much.

My children’s state school still does them, the two schools have been partnered for decades.

DC1 was 14 when they went, and had a great time, we enjoyed hosting the exchange here too. DC2 is going next year, and can’t wait.

I went in the 90s, it was arrive at the airport, be handed over to a complete stranger whose name I didn’t even know beforehand, then don’t have any contact with anyone else until you return to the airport 10 days later. I spent the days roaming the streets of the city with my exchange partner from dawn to dusk (I had a fabulous time). The school had no idea where I was, let alone my parents.

But Dd was carefully matched to someone who they thought she’d get on with, we had all their contact details, Dd met up with the other English people every day for organised trips, had the teacher who accompanied them checking in with her every single day, had to wear a lanyard with emergency details at all times, we had to be DBS checked to host.

I think my son's school still does an exchange, or at least it did before covid. I doubt very much he would want to go.

I did two in the 1990s. The French one was between our county and a department in France. I was 15, others in my year were still 14, and some of the French girls were only 13. You had to fill in a form with your age, interests and personality and they tried to match you up with someone suitable, which meant that we were all dotted around the area. I didn't have that much in common with my exchange partner and was quite jealous of my friend who got to go and stay on a farm with a girl who had her own pony!

It seems strange now with all the emphasis on safeguarding that you could just go off and stay for 2 weeks with an unvetted, unknown family (my mum wasn't thrilled about this at the time). This was pre-mobiles. I also remember 2 weeks feeling a very long time when it was time to have someone come to stay.

Our school also did a German exchange which worked better. It was just between our school and a German school, the teachers knew everyone, it was for a shorter time and there were more group activities organised for everyone. I got along better with my German partner.

I did one and it hugely boosted my French. DD has one later this year (y9) and everyone has had a DBS check. You have to gradually start preparing your kids to leave home - maybe this is why so many kids at schools have emotional regulation issues?

@backinthebox It was only set up regarding foreign exchange visits in 2012 or generally? It was called CRB when I had to have them for working in schools, but that was before 2012, so do you mean the name change, or the criminal record checking process?

I think it's just down to the individual school. There's nothing saying a school must or can't do them, so they happen if the teachers organise them (like most school trips I guess).

I think they can and do sometimes go wrong and that's the gamble of them really. There are cultural differences between countries. For example, in France, teenagers are generally allowed more freedom and kids often walk home alone to empty houses from a young (primary) age; there's an expectation of resilience and getting on with it. Less of the helicopter parenting we do here in the UK.

I do know of a few exchanges where friends got calls from their kids who were homesick and didn't get on with their exchange person. In my daughter's exchange, one of her school friends really didn't get on with her exchange person and so they went to stay with the teacher for the rest of the trip. Schools tend to have a backup plan for situations like this, they have to.

@Bushmillsbabe @Sceptical123 the CRB was set up in 2002 after the introduction of the Protection of Children Act in 1999. Prior to 2002 the checks were a laborious manual process carried out on each candidate applying for a job with children against List 99. The CRB check was also foolproof - it allowed Ian Huntley to slip through the net, so the DBS was set up to provide more thorough checks.

I pass regular background checks for work, including a DBS check among other more stringent security checks, so I am reasonably familiar with them. DH has worked for various government bodies and has been checked even more frequently and stringently than me.

So I still maintain the reason no one took a DBS check in the 90s for an exchange trip (or even a CRB check) was simply because those particular checks did not exist, and the only checks that did exist were in place just for teaching and childcare employees, not parents and volunteers.

@Chocolateismylovelife DC1 has been on an exchange to Germany with her state 6th form college, which is attached to a state school. She was offered the opportunity as a 6th former because the local state schools offer this normally to Y10-11 children but she missed out due to Covid restrictions. Both of the state secondary schools she attended offer exchange visits to France and Germany.