A New Home, Town

Arriving at Harvard from Kenya his freshman year, Leonard C. Kogos ’12 traded in his sandals and shorts for snow boots and long underwear.

Kogos’s host mother—a former resident of Kenya—took it upon herself to assimilate Kogos to his new environment by taking him shopping for winter clothes.

Kogos’s experience is one common to many other freshmen who come to Harvard from far away locales and try to adjust to what is literally a much colder college life.

Some international students like Kogos—as well as some students who live in the U.S. but far from Cambridge—are taken under the wing of the Harvard Freshman Host Family Program. Coordinated through the Freshman Dean’s Office, the program pairs freshman with local college alumni who share their academic and personal interests in order to help ease the students’ transition into University life.

FINDING THE RIGHT FIT

Incoming freshmen apply to receive a local host family in the summer prior to their freshman year. Participation is open to all freshmen and is especially encouraged for international students, according to Christina McFarlane, assistant to the dean of freshmen and coordinator of the Host Family Program.

After assignments have been made, freshman students and host families receive each other’s contact information. Host families—which usually contain at least one Harvard alum—are expected to take the initiative to reach out to their first-year students prior to the students’ arrival in Cambridge.

Hosts and students are introduced to each other for the first time at the beginning of the school year during an event hosted by the Freshman Dean’s Office.

For the past two years, McFarlane has worked closely with both host families and freshman students to design matches.

“Every student fills out an extensive application, where they answer questions about their personal and academic interests,” McFarlane said. “I take all of their responses into account and review the applications to ensure that each pairing is a good fit.”

The program seeks out host families by directly approaching University affiliates and sending additional letters to local alumni during their respective reunion weeks to invite them to serve as hosts for freshman students.

“We always ask interested graduates, friends, and colleagues—in addition to reunion classes—if they want to help welcome first-year students to Harvard,” said Dean of Freshmen Thomas A. Dingman ’67. “This program has been growing, and we know from testimonials that host families make the freshman year experience much richer, simply by inviting host students for home-cooked meals or introducing them to the community.”

RECIPROCAL REWARDS

Participants in the program said both sides of the equation have been rewarding.

Marco Chan ’11 was raised in Vancouver and currently lives in China. Even as a junior, he continues to maintain a close friendship with the host family assigned to him freshman year.

“Host families have been a great resource for a lot of students because it can be a challenging transition from high school to college and from their hometown to Cambridge,” Chan said. “I feel like it’s made the difference for me because my host parents are objective observers who are removed from your daily life but live in the community and know what Harvard is like.”

“It’s rare to have people like that available to advise you,” he added.

Chan said that his host family also helped introduce him to various areas of Boston during his freshman year and hosted him for Thanksgiving break during his sophomore year. He said that his host family members are among the people in Boston that he feels the closest to.

In her move from Singapore to Cambridge, Charlene Neo ’10 had a similar experience with her freshman year host family, with whom she still corresponds regularly.

“Words can’t express the gratitude that I have towards them,” she wrote in an e-mail.

Neo said when she came to Harvard as an international student, she had a difficult time adjusting to the American schooling system and dealing with homesickness.

“It was not an easy transition, coming to a place with top-notch students and faculty,” she said. “I was afraid, rather intimidated, and often worried.”

During her sophomore year, Neo was diagnosed with compartment syndrome—a condition that can lead to muscle death or nerve damage—and was bedridden for nearly two months. During her time recovering at University Health Services, Neo’s host parents visited her frequently and brought her food and drinks.

“They would check up on me every so often, and were always there if I needed any help,” she said.

Kevin J. Mulcahy, a host parent whose wife was a Harvard alumna, said the “most gratifying aspect” of the relationship is witnessing students’ growth over the course of their college careers.

“One of the reasons we enjoy this is when you’re dealing with your host students, you are dealing with people who are emerging as young independent adults with their own perspective and views,” Mulcahy said.

THE FUTURE AND BEYOND

Sorina Codrea ’12, who participated in the Host Family Program during her freshman year, questioned the relevance of the host program due to the recent adjustments to the academic calendar, which now includes over a month-long January Term break.

Codrea said that host families may have been more important to students last year when the two-week-long winter break was not enough time for many students to return home.

But McFarlane said that while the Office of Financial Aid provides a travel stipend for students receiving significant financial assistance to travel home over J-term, she did not anticipate the new academic calendar detracting from the relevance of the host family program.

Regardless of the changing schedule, for some host families and their students, the benefits of the program are clear.

“We fulfill some of the roles that parents cannot due to the distance or other constraints,” host dad Andrew C. Compaine ’81 said. “To be able to be a witness to these formative years has been a great honor and really enriched our lives.”

—Staff writer Barbara B. DePena can be reached at barbara.b.depena@college.harvard.edu.