Teens from Denmark, Norway experience American culture as exchange students at Stansbury High School

High school is stressful. Teens are constantly balancing homework, hobbies, home life, work and social pressures. Try adding to that list adapting to a new culture and learning a new language while leaving family and friends behind.

One might think so many new experiences would tip the scales, but that’s exactly what life is like for two students from Stansbury High School, and they’re both loving every moment of it.

Senior Therese Tasasen, 17, and junior Cecilie Oestergaard, 17, are both foreign exchange students who will be spending the school year at Stansbury High School. To them, local sights and sounds often taken for granted are both strange and exciting, and that’s exactly what they hoped for when they first decided to embark on this year-long adventure.

Both students found themselves in Tooele after applying to the International Student Exchange, a selective, non-profit organization which helps students from 40 different countries learn about different cultures. Participants spend the year living with an American host family, attending an American school, and making American friends.

“It [becoming a foreign exchange student] was just an impulse,” Oestergaard said. “I don’t know exactly why, but I decided it would be cool. I just decided one day that my life at home was too bland.”

At home, Oestergaard is a high school freshman living on the west coast of Denmark in Esbjerg — one of her country’s largest cities. It’s an important Danish seaport, which differs from Tooele in size and climate as well as culture. Where Utah is a land of temperature extremes, weather in Denmark remains relatively mild, and Tooele is far from being one of the nation’s largest cities. But that’s exactly why Oestergaard loves it.

Oestergaard wasn’t able to choose exactly where her experience as a foreign exchange student would take her, but she made one specification on her application: She wanted to live in a small town.

“Small towns seem more charming to me,” Oestergaard said. “It [Tooele] holds more personality [than a large city].”

For all the changes being a foreign exchange student has brought into Oestergaard’s life, she seems to be adjusting well. She has made many friends running with the school’s cross country team, and she even went on a blind date this past weekend.

“It was way fun,” Oestergaard said. “I wouldn’t have gone on a blind date at home. That was taking it a step further, but I have no regrets.”

Tasasen, a student from Nittedal, Norway, is also fitting in with her new surroundings. To her, life in Tooele is more of the same. She describes her home as being similar in size to Tooele and she’s kept up with some of her old hobbies. Her eight years of experience in competitive swimming at home helped her make the school swim team, and she spent the weekend with a few of her new friends at a swim meet.

“I kind of like everything, except not having my family and friends here,” Tasasen said of her experience so far.

Tasasen was more specific when she applied to become a foreign exchange student. Though she was unable to choose the state, she designated America as her country of choice.

“America is exciting,” Tasasen said. “It’s a big country, and I wanted to go to an English-speaking country.”

Both Tasasen and Oestergaard said people from America are surprisingly similar to people from their own countries.

“There are certain things that you need to adjust to, but it’s not that different,” Oestergaard said.

Still, Oestergaard said there is one big difference.

“It’s way easy to get Americans to smile,” she said. “In Denmark everyone is always pouting.”

The girls also had few complaints about their new lifestyle. Oestergaard cites the altitude, which she said makes it difficult to run, and Tasasen finds the local food options to be problematic. But one thing neither is about to have a fit over is the local school system.

“They [school] days are long and hard, but the good thing about America is that you get credit for trying,” Oestergaard said.

In comparison with their classes at home, both Oestergaard and Tasasen said American classes are easier to pass. Though American school days are longer and require more classes then she would normally take in Norway, Tasasen said she’s not struggling to get her assignments in on time.

“I barely have any homework,” she said, “and if you turn in every paper, you’ll get a good grade.”

Fortunately for her, Tasasen will receive regular school credit for attending Stansbury for a year, and when she goes home she’ll be able to resume her studies as usual. Oestergaard, on the other hand, will have to make up credit next year by entering her Danish high school again as a freshman.

Despite this, Oestergaard said spending a year in America will be well worth the extra year of school required.

With the upcoming holiday, Oestergaard will finally be able to take a break from those long days at school to investigate the real way Americans celebrate Christmas.

“I am excited to see how the American Christmas really works. You only see it in stories and movies [in Denmark],” Oestergaard said.

The idea of celebrating on Dec. 25, Christmas Day, is particularly exciting to Oestergaard. In Denmark, the holiday ends on Dec. 24, and that leaves most Danish residents without anything to do the next day.

“We don’t usually get out of our pajamas [on Christmas morning],” Oestergaard said.

For both, the idea of spending the holidays away from home has prompted some homesickness, but not too much.

“I miss my friends and family, but I knew that would come. I knew I would miss everybody,” Oestergaard said. “But I know that I will see them again, and that makes it easier.”

For now, Tasasen and Oestergaard can enjoy their own kind of American adventure while teaching locals about their own way of life. When they return home, they will have the opportunity to share what they have learned with their friends, family and neighbors. And that’s what being a foreign exchange student is all about: learning, teaching and growing.