When Pietro Fornasiero learned he was going to have an opportunity to leave his native Italy and come to South Jersey for an entire academic year as part of a student exchange program, he had two major items on his bucket list: He hoped to run up the art museum steps in Philadelphia like Rocky Balboa and he wanted to see New York City at Christmastime. Not only has the 17-year-old been able to cross off both, but he has also made so many other memories he knows will last a lifetime, all while establishing a special bond with the strangers who agreed to take him in and serve as his “family” during his time in America.
Tiffany Orihel and her husband Jeff, along with their two teenaged children, never imagined they would open their Washington Township home to a foreign exchange student. But it was brought to their attention that Fornasiero needed a place to stay, and as respected, active members of the community, they were recommended to be his host family. They knew it would be a commitment, but they took on the responsibility and welcomed him with open arms when he arrived last August—and he’s been treated like a member of their tight-knit clan ever since.
The Orihels have introduced him to American football through their 14-year-old son JP, and 16-year-old daughter Mia has shared classes and a lunch period with him at Washington Township High School while helping him get acclimated to his new surroundings and make friends. When the family has had to travel for sports or a previously scheduled vacation, Tiffany’s close friend Vicki Nigro has stepped in and opened her home to Fornasiero as well.
They have shared their family traditions with him—Thanksgiving was his favorite, since he had never experienced the American holiday before—and rooted for him as a key player on the Washington Township varsity boys basketball team. The only downsides, Tiffany jokes, are the rising grocery bills as she tries to feed a growing boy and the fact that Pietro only cooked for her once the week he got here.
“I was hoping I would get some more homemade Italian meals but it was one and done,” she says with a laugh. “But I don’t mind doing everything for him because I want him to have the ultimate experience.
“He’s thriving and doing great. He plays varsity basketball and he’s a starter; he speaks great English. … It’s definitely been a change [for our family] but we’ve adjusted, and we’ve loved having him. I’m definitely going to miss him when he leaves in July.”
Fornasiero has also visited the Jersey Shore, discovered a love for cheesesteaks, and attended his first NBA and NHL games along with the Eagles’ Super Bowl parade.
“That was amazing. The people were crazy and I had so much fun,” he says. “I’m really enjoying my time here. I came here for sports, but I wanted to know about the culture, meet new people and learn a new language. It’s an experience that can change your life.”
Fornasiero came to the U.S. through the organization AnB Education—which stands for Above and Beyond—a nonprofit based in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania. It places students with both the F-1 visa, in which host families may receive a stipend, and the J-1 visa, in which the hosts are not compensated at all.
As part of the latter group, the Orihels are required to provide either a private bedroom or a shared bedroom with a host sibling of the same sex within three years of age; a bed, desk and dresser; two meals a day on school days and three meals a day on non-school days. They also take care of his transportation to sports and other activities.
Tiffany files a monthly report with a local coordinator who gives support to both the families and the students under his or her supervision, while Laura Braley acts as AnB’s J-1 program coordinator for the entire country. Braley likes the J-1 program because it levels the playing field by allowing students who don’t come from wealthy families to have the opportunity to travel to the U.S., since they aren’t paying a stipend or tuition for a private school. Any public school is open to admitting a student who is residing within its district, and other South Jersey schools that AnB has partnered with include Haddon Township and Cinnaminson.
The only roadblock is finding enough local families to act as hosts.
“Truthfully, it’s getting harder and harder, and that’s mainly because it’s expensive,” Braley says. “Inflation is a real thing, and we are asking people to volunteer—they don’t get any monetary gain from it. That does present many challenges in finding host families, but we just do the best we can. … We’re definitely looking for ways to get our name out there and to get people like Tiffany, who have had a great experience, to tell people that even though it’s not monetary compensation you do get a lot of cultural benefit from doing it.”
Haddon Township resident Eileen Snyder has been on multiple sides of the equation, since she and her husband have hosted several students themselves and she also now serves as a regional representative for ASSE International Student Exchange Programs, recruiting host families from Cape May to Princeton. Like Braley, she often has a hard time finding people willing to open their homes, which is why she relies on repeat hosts and plans on filling the role again herself next year.
“It was something I always wanted to do,” she says of hosting. “I love learning about the different cultures and traditions and holidays, and just what teenagers are like in other countries. As a host and a representative, I’ve had students from very exotic places like Serbia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and the [traditional] European countries like Italy, Spain, Germany, France. It’s been quite an education for me, which has been nice.
“It’s just a great experience, and all types of people do it. I don’t have children of my own, but as a representative I have hosts with small children, adult children, empty-nesters, same-sex parents. … It’s not for every family—you have to have the space, and financially you have to be able to take another person into your home because you provide a space for them to study and to sleep, you’re providing three meals a day. It has to be the right fit.”
Snyder adds that most of the local school districts have been very accommodating to the exchange students in her program, singling out Cherry Hill and Collingswood in particular. Others have been slower to get on board but usually come around with some persistence from her or the host parents, and she stresses the importance of meeting all of the district’s deadlines for application.
Like AnB, ASSE tries to match host families with students who have similar interests, whether it’s sports or the arts. Both Braley and Snyder have seen many strong friendships cultivated that last long after the experience is over, with many hosts vising their student’s home in the future.
“I think it’s a great experience if you have children because they get to learn about other cultures and they get to make a lifelong friendship,” Snyder says. “I think those are the most successful matches, although I’ve had families with no children that have been great matches too. … It’s a very unique way to educate your children about other places and other cultures, other types of food, and you really don’t have to leave your own home—all of that comes to you.”
Of course, making a commitment for a semester or even the whole academic year can be a lot to ask, but there are programs in Haddonfield and Moorestown that allow local families to get the same experience on a smaller scale.
Bill Brown first became involved in exchange programs with schools in Japan during his teaching career in Philadelphia, and he fell in love with the Japanese culture on the first of his 14 trips there. After retiring he wanted to share the experience with others, so be brought the idea to Haddonfield, where he has resided since 1968. The Haddonfield Japan Exchange was officially founded as a nonprofit in 2006, and for nearly 20 years the organization has sent local students to Japan and welcomed Japanese students here in alternating summers.
This summer, 18 students from Haddonfield Memorial High School and two chaperones will visit Sendai, Japan for two weeks. While staying with host families, they will get a chance to experience a typical Japanese school day, learn about the lifestyle and take in local sights.
“It’s just a great opportunity for the kids, and hundreds and hundreds of kids have benefited from this both in Japan and the United States,” Brown says. “One of the kids said to me, ‘Mr. Brown, this is the trip of a lifetime.’ Some of them go on to minor in Japanese in college or take Japanese courses.”
Brown is about to turn 92 and has some mobility issues, so he won’t be making the trip himself. But he is just as enthusiastic about the program as when he first started it, and during years when the Japanese students visit the U.S., he helps plan group activities during the week, such as visits to Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., tubing excursions on the Delaware River and trips to the bowling alley. On the weekends, the Japanese students spend time with their host families, who often taken them to places they’re interested in, like New York or the Shore.
“Haddonfield has been very, very generous to us in providing host families,” Brown notes. “I always say at the meetings or the dinners we host for them, they are really the backbone of the program because they open up their homes and their hearts. I think each family that has hosted has really enjoyed it and there are never any problems. Some of them have made lifelong friendships.”
Brown credits Maggie Gammie, a history teacher at Haddonfield, for taking on many of the responsibilities in planning and coordinating the program at this point, and she in turn is grateful for all the assistance from sponsoring businesses and other residents.
“The community is really supportive of it, especially when we’re in hosting years,” she says. “We get a lot of support from local businesses or we’ll fundraise through the community to be able to provide them some of these experiences, like going to D.C. or going to Philadelphia. There’s also quite a following among the students and past students who have gone, and the parents of students who have gone. We’re a board of all volunteers, and a lot of them are parents whose kids had an amazing experience when they went. They saw how it much it meant to their kids and they want to keep it going for the next ones to come.”
She first went to Japan as a chaperone in 2023 and made strong friendships with her host family, who took her to visit an ancient castle and to Matsushima Bay. Last year, she opened her Cherry Hill home to a Japanese chaperone, whose No. 1 request was to visit Amish country in Lancaster, since she watched Little House on the Prairie as a child in Japan and wanted to get a feel for the pioneer lifestyle.
Many of the Haddonfield families who sent children to Japan end up hosting themselves, and like Gammie they just enjoy getting to know each other.
“Everyone has always been excited to participate in it,” she says. “Everyone feels like it’s an experience they wouldn’t have otherwise. It gives them an appreciation for the culture, and everybody walks away having made new friends—which is really cool, especially for high schoolers to say they have a friend in Japan.”
Similar bonds have been made between students from Moorestown and Valencia, Spain, thanks to a program started a few years ago by married couple Dan Ladik and Maggie Marrero-Ladik. She is a native of Puerto Rico and both wanted their two sons, now in college, to have an appreciation for other cultures. When they found out about Emilio and Mayte Requena—married teachers from Valencia who used to take their students to Wisconsin every summer—they reached out and offered Moorestown as a new place for them to visit.
So for the past three summers, they’ve brought a group of 16- and 17-year-olds for two weeks to stay with local host families and interact with peers from Moorestown. Ladik and Marrero-Ladik organize group activities like Wiffle-ball tournaments, basketball games and tours of Moorestown High School, while the host families take students on additional trips on the weekends.
“Most of the students are visiting the U.S. for the very first time, which makes it even more interesting,” Marrero-Ladik says. “All they know is what they’ve seen in movies and on social media, so for them to be here is a great experience. They’re not just visiting on a tour as most trips would be, they are spending time with a family and participating in family activities and getting a wonderful, well-rounded experience.”
“It’s a very local experience because they’re embedded with a family,” Ladik adds. “We went to Ocean City and saw the Boardwalk—there’s nothing like that in their area. … Their favorite thing is to go to Main Street and go to the ice cream parlor. A lot of the things they do are very simple, but a lot of families do take them on trips to the Poconos, to Washington or to New York.”
Ladik and Marrero-Ladik have become close friends with the Requenas and have visited them the last four years in Valencia, and several Moorestown families joined them last summer. Their two sons have stayed with host families, and their oldest, Xavier—now attending in college in California—has become so close with his hosts that he is spending his spring break with them.
“It corresponds with a week of the most celebrated local festival in Valencia called Las Fallas,” Marrero-Ladik says. “His Spanish family is intrinsically involved with this celebration. It’s a really big deal and they’ve talked to Xavier about it, and he’s seen pictures, and he really wanted to experience it. You can imagine how this family is feeling, their pride that their American son is traveling across half the world to experience this important festival with them.”
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Published and copyrighted in South Jersey Magazine, Volume 21, Issue 11 (February 2025)
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