A wonderful experience!

JYF allows eager college students the opportunity to go to Paris and immerse themselves fully in French culture. You live with a host family, take classes at French universities, and are expected to speak french primarily. While these opportunities do allow for immersion, given that the program is comprised entirely of American students, it is hard to ever fully immerse yourself in the unknown culture and language. There are times you find yourself speaking more English than French, and you can choose to isolate yourself from your host family so as to only interact with them at meals. It takes a lot of agency on the part of the student to decide not to opt out and to fully embrace the discomfort that comes with being an exchange student.