This year, three students attending Naperville North have taken a risk by leaving the comfort of their homes to travel miles across the Atlantic Ocean to America, but they’ve already been rewarded with experiences they may never live again.

Naperville North’s exchange students must adjust to a second language, a second family and new school. The generic problems of high schoolers around the world remain all too familiar.

Senior Tori Andradottir, an exchange student from Iceland, described her experienced so far as worthwhile.  

“You’re going to another school away from your friends and family,” Andradottir said. “I think it’s worth it because you meet new people and a new culture.”

Other NNHS exchange students are experiencing similar cultural shifts.

Senior Alice Peterson from Norway has only been in the United States for a few weeks. A city as large as Naperville has been an adjustment compared to the size of her hometown.

“We live in a suburb of Oslo,” Peterson said. “It is so small, like 3,000 people.”

NNHS’ exchange students are a part of the AFS Student Exchange Program. All students, schools and families are given a background check to ensure safety for the student going abroad. AFS Naperville/Aurora hosting volunteer Arnette Schultz has worked with AFS since 1990 and has hosted over a dozen exchange students.

That experience has left a deep appreciation for the challenges the students face.

“You just don’t know what you don’t know –like the astronaut who looks down on the blue marble and doesn’t see it as lines on a map but as humankind,” Schultz said.

Unlike many American teenagers, the thought of college doesn’t give these girls as much panic. Each student has either one or two more years of school back at home.

When asked on her plans for the future, junior Aline Hottinger from Switzerland explains she isn’t worried.

“I have two more years in high school, but I don’t know what I will do after that,” Hottinger said.

Peterson admits NNHS is more strict than school in Norway.

“We don’t have dress codes and you don’t need a hall pass, just those small things,” Peterson said.

Only two weeks into her journey, Peterson already has learned a lot.

“You have to put yourself out there and just take initiative and talk to people. People are very helpful and they are very nice here,” Peterson said.

Despite all the major cultural differences the girls have experienced in their time as exchange students, the biggest acclimation has been something unexpectedly minor: the water tastes weird.

Andradottir says it is the biggest difference so far.