Newswise — Tom Grimwood of Burns has a 50-year history of sharing Thanksgiving with University of Kansas international students.
He was three years old in 1954 when his mother, Betty, contacted KU with an idea to invite international students to spend the holiday with families in Burns, a farm community about 60 miles northeast of Wichita. The tradition, which was named the Betty Grimwood Thanksgiving Homestay Program in 1999 after her death, is now in its 53rd year.
This Thanksgiving will be no different for Tom Grimwood. He and his wife, Nedy, and their young son plan to host a KU international student over the holiday as do a few other families in Burns.
As youngsters, Tom and his brother, Charles, now living in Salina, and other Burns children learned world geography in part through international students from KU. Their parents, Ted and Betty, kept in touch with their Thanksgiving guests and later visited some abroad. For 45 years, Betty Grimwood worked with the Burns United Methodist Women to organize the three-hour drive to Lawrence to gather international students.
"The Methodist church women continue to sponsor it," Tom Grimwood said. He is a soil scientist who lived abroad for many years and now commutes to Wichita to teach Spanish, Italian and English to business groups. Although his father died in 2004, Tom Grimwood continues his parents' Thanksgiving tradition.
Many host families live less than an hour's drive from KU, but some have participated from as far west as Lyons and as far east as St. Louis, Mo. Lack of bus service to many communities has made it difficult in recent years for some families to continue to participate.
Since bus service to Ellsworth, about 26 miles north of Lyons, was discontinued a few years ago, farmers Don and Eula Mae Goodfellow have participated when they could arrange a seven-hour roundtrip drive from their central Kansas home to Lawrence. The Goodfellows have been hosts in part because of their own experiences abroad. As McPherson College students in the 1950s, both had been in exchange programs: she with 4-H in Belgium and he with the International Voluntary Service in Iraq.
Eula Goodfellow said one year an international student found a ride to Lyons with another KU student. The Goodfellows and their guest then drove to eastern Nebraska for a Thanksgiving dinner with one of the Goodfellow children. Lawrence was an easy stop on their return drive to Lyons.
In all, host families from nearly 50 communities in Kansas and Missouri have participated in recent years, including Baldwin City, Basehor, Burlington, Chanute, De Soto, Eudora, Eureka, Garnett, Girard, Herington, Kansas City, Lawrence, Leavenworth, Leawood, Lecompton, Lenexa, Linwood, Madison, Marion, Merriam, Newton, Olathe, Overbrook, Overland Park, Peabody, Prairie Village, Roeland Park, Sedgwick, Shawnee, Silver Lake, Tonganoxie, Topeka, Valley Falls, Westwood, Whitewater and Wichita in Kansas; and Drexel, El Dorado Springs, Florissant, Gladstone, Grandview, Hardin, Independence and St. Louis in Missouri.
This fall, 1,624 international students rom 112 different countries are enrolled at KU. The 10 countries with the greatest number of students at KU are:
— China (including Hong Kong and Macau), 300— India, 224— Republic of Korea, 192— Saudi Arabia, 118— Taiwan, 71— Japan, 70— Turkey, 32— Germany, 31— Canada, 25— Peru, 24
KU's International Student and Scholar Services offices is again seeking host families for the program, which provides new international students the opportunity to experience Thanksgiving with a U.S. family.
Host families are needed for one or more international students either for the full Thanksgiving break — Tuesday, Nov. 20, to Sunday, Nov. 25 — or for Thanksgiving Day only — Thursday, Nov. 22. Last year, 24 families from communities in Kansas and Missouri and 24 students participated.
Interested families should contact Melissa Rogers, program coordinator, at (785) 864-3617 or [email protected]. The application deadline is Nov. 1.
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