Kirkland resident and Juanita High School student Isabella Batson has been awarded a scholarship for the 2015-2016 academic year and will join a group of fifty American high school students sponsored by ASSE International Student Exchange Programs who will live with a host family and attend high school in Germany for one academic year.

Since 1983, the United States Department of State and the German government have co-sponsored the prestigious Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange Scholarship Program to help prepare ambitious young people for a global future. The CBYX program has enabled more than 23,000 students to expand their global perspectives and make new friends. Congress-Bundestag students are youth ambassadors of the United States, sharing their life and culture with their German hosts and building greater understanding of the United States and its diversity.

As a Congress-Bundestag scholarship recipient, Isabella will experience German life firsthand. She will live with a carefully selected host family while becoming a member of her German host community, attending school, participating in community life and learning more than she ever imagined about another country and culture, about the world and its diversity and about herself.

When Isabella leaves for Germany, a group of German scholarship students will be arriving to live with American host families while attending high school in the USA. Students and families interested in receiving more information about hosting a Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange Scholarship winner from Germany or other ASSE International Student Exchange Programs can call 1-800-733-2773 or visit ASSE’s website at host.asse.com.