Somewhere right now, a teenager is packing a suitcase and a grandmother's recipe. Hosting means that recipe gets made in your kitchen — new words at breakfast, new holidays on the calendar, and a second family on the other side of the world for the rest of your life. Here are eighteen of the countries ISE students call home.
From Madrid to Berlin, this is the Europe of long dinners and old streets — where a Tuesday meal can outlast an American holiday and every town has a square worth sitting in. Students often arrive with two or three languages already in their pocket and firm, well-argued opinions about bread. Your student might be startled by how early Americans eat, and then completely won over by Friday night football. What they bring back to your table is centuries of knowing how to linger at it.
At your table
Traditions you might share
A student from Spain might teach you that a meal is not something you finish — it is somewhere you stay, ideally with somebody's family paella recipe on the table.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Germany might arrive with real recipes for the holidays — and a December full of Advent candles, lantern songs, and Christmas-market stories your family will keep.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Italy might take over your kitchen for one night and hand you a dish their nonna has made for fifty years — made now, in Michigan, for you.
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Traditions you might share
A student from France might turn Saturday breakfast into an event — crepes from scratch, opinions about butter — and leave your family a standing invitation to their side of the Atlantic.
Explore on the mapUp here, winter is not a problem to be endured — it is the main event. Denmark and Norway raise teenagers who bike through sleet, hike on purpose, and light candles against the dark like it is an art form, because it is. Students from the Nordics often arrive quietly independent and almost insultingly unbothered by a Michigan cold snap. By February, your student might be the one dragging your family outside — and making the dark months feel like something to look forward to.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Denmark might teach your family hygge by December — candles lit, aebleskiver in the pan, and the discovery that a dark winter night is something you can actually look forward to.
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A student from Norway might get your whole family outside in January and make you like it — then mark May 17 on your calendar forever, with waffles.
Explore on the mapThis is the Europe where history is not something in a textbook — it is what grandma lived through, and she will tell you about it over Sunday lunch. Students from this part of the world often grew up in families where freedom is a recent memory and dinner-table conversation goes deep fast. Your student might come with a dry wit that sneaks up on you and a walking-city childhood spent in streets older than the United States. ISE works with partner agencies across the region — Czechia is one place your student might call home.
At your table
Traditions you might share
A student from Czechia might bring your family a Christmas Eve unlike any other — carp and potato salad, shoes by the door for St. Nicholas, and stories from a city straight out of a storybook.
Explore on the mapFrom Mexico City to the Brazilian coast, this is a part of the world where family means everyone within shouting distance and food takes the time it takes — tamales are a two-day project, and nobody is sorry about it. Students often arrive warm, musical, and physically incapable of letting a birthday pass uncelebrated. Your student might hug your relatives on first meeting and adopt your friends as their own. Expect your kitchen to get busier, your playlist to get better, and your December to gain some candlelight.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Brazil might fill your house with music and pao de queijo — and by June, your family will be celebrating Festa Junina in a Michigan backyard.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Mexico might teach your family that tamales are a two-day project worth every minute — and that remembering the people you love is something you can do with marigolds and a meal.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Colombia might make arepas a permanent part of your family's weekend — and light up your porch with little candles the first week of December.
Explore on the mapNight markets in Taipei, ramen counters in Tokyo, a bowl of pho on a Hanoi sidewalk at seven in the morning — this is arguably the best-fed corner of the planet, and its students know it. They often arrive with a work ethic that humbles adults and a care for daily ritual — shoes at the door, food arranged like it matters, elders honored by habit. Your student might treat your kitchen like a mission field and your report card expectations like a warm-up. The lunar calendar is about to matter in your house.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Japan might teach your family that a packed lunch can be an act of love — and years from now you will still be getting New Year's cards from Tokyo.
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Traditions you might share
A student from South Korea might install a permanent kimchi shelf in your fridge and Korean barbecue in your repertoire — and show your family what a Seollal bow means on New Year's morning.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Thailand might ruin takeout pad thai for you forever by making the real thing — and teach your family to float a wish downriver on a candlelit krathong.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Vietnam might make your kitchen smell like real pho on a snowy Saturday — and when Tet comes, your family will get red envelopes and a new holiday.
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A student from Taiwan might introduce your family to soup dumplings and proper bubble tea — and hang lanterns with you when Lunar New Year comes to Michigan.
Explore on the mapThe old Silk Road ran through here — mountain passes, endless steppe, and a rule of hospitality so absolute that a stranger at the door still gets the best seat and the first cup of tea. Students from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Mongolia often grow up between languages and between worlds: smartphones and horseback, city apartments and summer pastures. Your student might treat your grandparents with instinctive reverence and a Michigan January with mild amusement. Few Americans ever meet this part of the world. Your family could know it by name.
At your table
Traditions you might share
A student from Kazakhstan might show your family what steppe hospitality means — and when Nauryz arrives in March, your table will be part of a tradition older than most countries.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Kyrgyzstan might fold your family into a hospitality tradition carried down from Silk Road caravans — and make manty dumplings a house favorite by October.
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Traditions you might share
A student from Mongolia might hand your family a bowl of milk tea and a story about the open steppe — and prove, all winter, that nobody handles cold with more style.
Explore on the mapThe real cultural exchange is not a presentation at school. It is a Tuesday night when your student says "can I cook?" — and suddenly your kitchen smells like somebody's grandmother's house six thousand miles away.
A German student does not just make bratwurst — they make it the way their family makes it, sauerkraut and mustard and all, and then patiently explain what Americans have been doing wrong with the bun.
From a world-cuisine post on Lisa's page
That dish comes from somewhere — a bakery on a corner, a market square after school, a street their family has walked for generations. Hosting means hearing about those places from someone who misses them and loves telling you.
From a world-culture post on Lisa's page
Your student leaves Michigan knowing how to make a proper pasty, what a euchre hand looks like, and why cider mills matter in October. The trade is fair. Paella for pasties. Pho for pot roast. Everybody eats well. That's a Michigan hosting year in a nutshell.
An exchange year has a rhythm to it — and Michigan families get to share every beat, from the nervous airport hello to the graduation-cap goodbye.
Fall
An airport welcome sign, a first bedroom tour — and a first Friday night under the stadium lights, learning why the whole town shows up.
Holidays
They carve their first pumpkin and pass their first Thanksgiving stuffing — and teach your family how the holidays are celebrated back home.
Winter & Spring
First real snowfall, first snow day, first sledding wipeout — then spring arrives and suddenly you're taking prom photos in the driveway.
June
The airport hug at the end of the year is the hard part — but host families will tell you it's the start of a lifelong connection. Pen pals, video calls, visits both ways. A second family, permanently. It's the biggest of the reasons families host again and again.
Lisa personally matches Michigan families with students whose interests and personality fit your home. No forms-first runaround, no pressure — just a conversation about who might belong at your table.