Host families are needed for the New Brunswick International Student Program.
Students have visited from all over the world.
Matthew Kernighan and his family have been a host family to several students since 2014.
His family has a student from Mexico named Patricio with them until June adding most of the students have to adapt to small-town life.
“Most of them really just embrace that. This is a change and it’s for a short period of time.
They quickly adjust to our rural lifestyle and see the value and beauty in it,” Kernighan said.
Kernighan is the vice-principal at St. George Elementary and the homestay coordinator for Eastern Charlotte County.
Pato’s family came to New Brunswick last weekend for a visit and stayed in Saint John and Saint Andrews.
Saint John educator Caroline Christie also has an international student with her family this year.
Grade 11 student Eylül Konak is from Turkey and able to attend classes with Christie’s daughter as they both attend Saint John High.
Christie said Konak will also be with the family next year.
Heather and Grant Bourque of Moncton are another homestay family hosting three students from Germany, Spain and Chile since 2018.
In addition, Heather is the homestay coordinator for eastern New Brunswick.
Grant Bourque said their first student Lenya from Germany and her mom visited them a few months after the school year ended.
“Her mother wanted to see the family that Lenya had lived with for a year. It was a great experience. Lenya and her mother also came back to Canada probably six months after that to see a part of Canada they hadn’t seen,” Bourque said.
Patricio ‘Pato’ Constantino of Mexico is an international student living this term with the Kernighan family in Pennfield, N.B. pic.twitter.com/3WgMcEWV3v
— Tamara Steele (she/her) 🇨🇦 (@tamarasteele1) May 5, 2022
