Youth For Understanding (YFU)

I was incredibly grateful to win the Kikkoman National Scholarship for a summer exchange in Japan, but my experience was entirely ruined by an unsafe hosting environment and an appallingly unprofessional response from YFU Japan. Despite being promised full transportation coverage for school and YFU events, I was forced to pay out-of-pocket, faced severe boundary violations, and was ultimately gaslighted and blamed by YFU staff when I asked for help. I highly advise future exchange students to think twice before using this organization.

My host mother was also my YFU Area Representative (who has hosted for 5 years). Because she worked three jobs, her home environment was entirely unsuited for an exchange student:
- She operated an English school on the lower level of her home and came upstairs around 10:00 or 11:00 PM. She consistently turned on bright lights, made loud noises, and made phone calls right outside my room.

- She began calling out to me in the middle of the night and early morning to check if I was awake. When I asked her to stop so I could sleep, she raised her voice and became hostile.

-She repeatedly walked in on me while I was changing without warning. She also made inappropriate, highly uncomfortable comments about my weight, legs, and butt, and pressured me to eat foods I explicitly told her I disliked.

-I was told to help run her private English school and perform outdoor chores in 87-degree heat before she left for work.

The Kikkoman Scholarship explicitly stated that my transportation to school and YFU events would be fully covered. Instead, I faced severe financial distress due to YFU's mismanagement:

- My host mother dismissed my questions about transportation fees. I was forced to pay for daily travel out of pocket, completely depleting my funds. She even lied to YFU Japan saying she gave me money for transportation.

- YFU Japan refused to cover my travel to a mandatory Kikkoman event, forcing me to use the last of my money to attend.

- After the event, I completely ran out of money at the station. In front of other students, the Area Representative we were with explicitly motioned and told me to bypass/jump the ticket gate. She then forced me to sign a paper acknowledging a 3,000 yen loan to get home, despite me telling her I had no money left to repay it.

When I contacted YFU Japan to report these issues and request a host family switch, their response was completely unprofessional, defensive, and deeply harmful. In phone calls and emails, YFU Japan staff:

- Dismissed Sexual Harassment & Boundary Violations: When I told them that my host mother walked in on me changing and made comments about my body, she told me "it was fine" and that "walking in on you changing is okay."

- Normalized Extreme Sleep Deprivation: When I explained I was falling asleep at school from exhaustion, the coordinator dismissed it, saying it is "normal for Japanese kids to get less than 7 hours of sleep."

- Blamed me: Instead of investigating the Area Rep's lies, YFU Japan sent me an email turning the blame entirely on me.

Direct quotes from the email-

"I heard that at the Tachikawa station you left through the exit and entered by not using the ticket gate... We were all appalled by your unreasonable behavior." (Directly ignoring that their own Area Rep told me to do this).
"If you want to continue the program, the one needs to change is YOU not Host Mother."
"There is a saying 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do.'"

I tried doing everything in my power to be a respectful, flexible, and open-minded student. In return, YFU Japan protected a dishonest Area Representative, ignored clear safety and boundary violations, and actively gaslighted a student under their care. They are completely one-sided, unprofessional, and failed their basic duty to provide a safe exchange environment. I do not recommend.

My child studied abroad in Sweden from the US (2018/2019). He not only returned with a more mature and expanded understanding of the world, but his personal social skills grew tremendously. I was worried a bit in the beginning with all the paper work and not getting placed until end of the summer. But, they made up for it with the extensive orientation and focus on the kids all forming a strong social network before they left and during their stay. The first few days of his arrival was also focused on establishing a social network with all the other study abroad students in the country, basically establishing their mini support group. The host family was amazing and I can't say enough good things about them. My son would also visit with the other students (from other countries) and learned just much about their cultures as well. He not only came back with a broader global perspective, but he also came back with a broader set of social skills. This was very helpful for his first year of college where he didn't know many people. What he learned and experienced was worth far more than the cost of the trip!

I spent a year with YFU in Spain. They are a total mess. They charge exorbitant amount of fees and then do not deliver on any of their promises. The host family's background check was sketchy - to put it mildly (according to YFU the host mom lying about her age and birth date was OK and "met the local background check requirements"). They failed to mediate when I had issues with the host family, failed to inform my parents about the issues, and then simply ordered me to pack my stuff within 48 hrs and move to a new city!

The only person I could contact was the local rep - despite their claims that they provide 24/7 support.

When I contacted my parents and they talked to YFU in Washington DC they not only did not help resolve the situation, did not apologize, but insisted they had done everything they were supposed to do.

The YFU Australia program is a mess! YFU USA offered none of the orientation that was promised before or after travel, and YFU Australia offered none of the orientation promised, nor any of the program support during the trip. The host family did not seem to have been background checked, and when it was clear that a move was in order, the program was not helpful or responsive. Rather than delivering on the promise to work together for a successful experience, they created a dangerous and damaging situation!

The only contact there was with YFU staff in Australia was with the local volunteer, and when the program could not provide a host family for the second leg of the trip, they refused to refund the money we had paid.
Mixed response: relieved to be home, and profoundly disappointed at the loss of a great opportunity.

YFU program is super supportive program in my opinion. They took care of me very great and I was super fun that once I could have such a great opportunity to become a YFU exchange student in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin 🇺🇸. This program provides the home that located in the safety state which is very nice to me and of course my parents that we would not be worried about that at all year long. In every two or three months the program will have a student conference in Milwaukee so I can hang out with other people from all around the world (I mean we could get to know so many international people from around the world)