Students earn scholarships to travel the world

Eight Whitefish High School students will travel abroad this summer and next school year thanks to scholarships from the AFS exchange student Global Prep program.

“It’s a chance to experience other cultures around the world,” Whitefish High School student Jasmine Reese said about her upcoming exchange to France.

“It’s a chance to get out of here,” joked Hayden Brandt, who will take on a one-year exchange to Netherlands.

Other students accepting a one-year exchanges are Galen Jamison to Norway and Sydney Louchard to Italy. Students on summer exchanges include Delaney Lewis to Poland, Reese to France, Jeff Hyer to Kenya, Katrina Funk to Hungary and Makkie Haller to Egypt.

“I’ve been studying Arabic and I’m really interested in the culture,” said Haller, who aspires to one day work for the state department.

All of the students earned full scholarships, varying between $4,000 to $6,000. Whitefish High School students secured all of the available scholarships in the state, with the exception of one that went to a Glacier High School student.

“This is the largest amount of students from Whitefish who have gone on and AFS exchange in the history of the AFS program in Whitefish, which dates back to the early 70s,” explained Ray Boksich, who helps coordinate the program.

Whitefish High School has a tradition of hosting exchange students, which led to some of these scholarship opportunities.

“Two of the Global Prep scholarships were made possible for only Whitefish students because Whitefish High School agreed to go over its normal hosting quota of six students and accepted eight students for the current year,” Boksich said.

Already, four exchange students are planning to come to Whitefish for the upcoming school year.

“Whitefish AFS is off and running,” Boksich said.

Families interested in hosting an exchange student should call 406-212-0261.