As graduation season approaches, exchange students are finishing their time in Chelsea, coming from places like Spain, France and ect.. enjoying every last moment of their year abroad in the United States.
“My favorite memory is my first football game, and it was a color blast. I had a lot of fun with my friends, and the games were super fun. Football season was definitely my favorite time of the year,” Lola Creton (‘26) from Belgium said.
These exchange students changed so much, from being the new kids, to having so many friends over one year with one of the best experiences of their lives, and now it’s finally coming to a close.
“The first time I met all the exchange students, it was really awkward at the beginning, but then it became really fun. Going to school together and having each other now is very nice,” Emma Roman Marti (‘28) from Spain said.
These students had a very challenging year in Chelsea, learning English, starting from scratch, with school on top of that, but it was more than that. This year isn’t just fun for them, but it’s going to help them for the rest of their lives, not just educationally, but socially.
“I think I'm more open-minded and yeah,I think I'm more positive and kind. I definitely learned how to make friends, and I'm definitely not as shy as I was when I got here,” Roman said.
As the school year comes to a close, these students were asked to summarize their year in 3 words. Here’s what they said.
“Amazing, hard, and fun. Amazing, because it is just such a great experience to just meet new people and just go to another country. Hard because at the beginning it's hard, you don't really have anybody, so you don’t know what to do. And fun, because there are a lot of different experiences that you’ve never had. You start to try new things,” Roman said.
While these students came here for schooling, they made their favorite and best memories outside of school in their free time.
“My favorite memory was during the swim season at SEC when I had to swim my 100 breaststroke. When I finished, the whole team was cheering for me, and they were extremely supportive, and that was one of my favorite memories of my life,” Ane Doval (‘28) from Spain said.
As the deadline for the students to leave comes closer, these students were asked what they thought of Chelsea before and after they got here.
“I thought Chelsea was a beautiful city, and there were a lot of things to do, and I loved Main Street to see at night with the lights, and I thought that the restaurants were cool,” Creton said. “My thoughts haven’t changed. Now I have a lot of memories in these streets. I really loved it.”
