An exchange year is a great opportunity for you!

There are many different organizations out there. For a list of those which are certified to operate in the U.S. look at www.csiet.org. If the program is not listed there, don’t use it! You should also check with your high school counselor for a recommendation as a program is only as good as the local representatives.

Some good ones are Rotary (the cheapest, but most competitive), Aspect, AFS, YFU, 4-H.

You will need to apply to the organization you choose (you can apply to more than one). Make sure that you are HONEST on your application! IT will ask many things about you. That is what your potential host family will look at to pick you!

If you are applying for scholarships, you may need to do it soon, as deadlines for most are this semester for the 08-09 school year.

For more information on being an exchange student, look at this website: http://www.exchangestudentworld.com/

Though there are partial and full scholarships that you can find all over the web. My advice is, apply for as many scholarships as you can to widen your chance of getting one, and at the same time work on arranging the means to get the required amount of money for this.

What you do is find the organization the best suits you in terms of location and price and so on.

Then comes the next step, the application. Mostly there will be preapplications for you to fill out online, and then you will be given the full application which is quite big actually and involves essays written by you as well as lots of personal information (One of the applications I read asked to put pictures of me and my friends as well as my place of living and talk about them).

There are enrollment fees and other fees that go along with the applications which will all be mentioned on the organization’s website.

From that point on, just wait and hope that you get accepted. Then they’ll take care of the rest.

Here are a few websites to check out:

http://www.twoworldsunited.com/high_school_study_abroad.html

http://www.rotary.com

http://www.asse.com

Google “High school abroad” for more organizations.

I am dieing to go Germany for an academic year at high school but unfortunately for me I live in Israel and so far no good results.

It is an amazing opportunity and I can see why you want to get involved in this.

Good luck! Enjoy your new country!