The Essential Au Pair Guide

By Kim Trutane

"The Essential Au Pair Guide" is the perfect reference for any young person considering a year in the U.S. as an au pair. Kim understands the program inside and out - having hosted au pairs for her two boys, and also working for an au pair agency. She is truly passionate about cultural exchange programs and realizes the value they provide to all who participate, and the world as a whole. "The Essential Au Pair Guide" covers everything from deciding whether or not to become an au pair, to selecting the right host family, to the realities of living with an American family. Every prospective au pair should read this guidebook. It truly is "essential" and I wholeheartedly recommend it!" Julie Brewer, 20-year au pair agency professional.

Want to be an au pair? The Essential Au Pair Guide is your must-have manual for finding the best host family for you. Written by an eight-year veteran of the au pair world in the popular San Francisco area, this guidebook details what families in the U.S. are looking for in an au pair, what your probable work schedule will be, the ins and outs of interviewing, and exactly how your personality will play into making your match successful. If you are considering investing a year of your life in this cultural exchange program, you need to know how the program plays out with real parents, children, and you--the overseas nanny. With the U.S. Department of State setting the rules and monitoring the agencies, au pairs have certain protections. But the guidelines can also be strict if you and the host family do not get along, and you may find yourself back on a plane headed to your home country. Making a great match from the beginning is by far the best way to avoid losing your program or having a unhappy year. Author Trutane increases your chances of finding your ideal "home away from home" and gives solid advice on how to communicate with your hosts, leading to a respectful, pleasant working relationship and a fantastic experience in the U.S.!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kim Trutane
• Release date: Feb 15, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311744456

Kim Trutane

Kim has worked and lived in the Berkeley, California area for 13 years. For 8 of those, she worked as an area director to a major au pair agency.

Book preview

The Essential Au Pair Guide

By Kim Trutane

Published by Kim Trutane at Smashwords

Copyright 2014 Kim Trutane

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting my hard work!

Chapter 1 - Introduction

I worked for an au pair agency in California for eight years. Through my job, I have met and supervised hundreds of au pairs and host families. I started as a host mother, and our first (and fabulous!) au pair will be translating this book into Brazilian Portuguese.

Now you know about me, but I wish I could learn more about you. I admire au pairs tremendously. You know more than one language. You are prepared to leave your home for a working adventure to broaden your knowledge of the world. You’ll be in a different country, living with a host family you probably have never met in person, following their rules and taking care of their kids. All the au pairs I have met have been brave, even the shy ones. Good luck to you!

Because you were wise enough to buy this guidebook, you will have something more than luck. You will share the insights I have gained from working with hundreds of au pairs and host families. I want you to get the most out of your year, and that means matching with a family that likes you, is respectful of you, and with whom you share some basic values.

The intention of this book is to help you find a host family compatible enough so that you both will get what you what out of the year, and won’t be in danger of rematch. Rematches put your year at risk, although I will later describe times when they are your best course of action. When you have a year of your life on the line, plus the expenses of applying, you definitely want to end up with a great situation!

How can you get a host family that will be your second family for life? The first thing to do is to take a hard look at yourself.

Chapter 2 - Your Valuable Skills

The first step to making a great match is looking in the mirror. We each seem normal to ourselves, and most of us think of ourselves as fairly average. But how would an impartial observer rate your strengths, values, and needs?

Childcare Experience

Your childcare skills are your ticket here, and your toolbox for work. You want to have a lot of different tools in that box, and have experience using those tools. Childcare hours are used to sort lists of au pairs, families like to begin by looking at the applications of the most experienced au pairs.

There is one big no-no about stating your hours. DON’T EXAGGERATE! If you say you have been taking care of your stepbrother since birth, and he was born when you were eight years old, don’t count any hours until you were at least fourteen. No one will believe that you were truly the responsible person in charge of a young child when you were eight years old. Explain in your essay how you played with and changed the diaper of your little stepbrother, but don’t count those hours.

If you state that you were a full-time student at the university, and you worked at a language school, and at the movie theater, and you took care of your friend’s baby for 20 hours a week, hosts will click away from your application immediately. Hours like that are unfathomable and give the impression that you are not honest. Hosts can do math, and want to see that you have conveyed a reasonable and accurate description of your life.

What are the best kinds of childcare experience? The experience that you really have is the best one for you to claim. But here is how hosts think about various kinds of experience:

Babysitting, if the parents are actually away from the home, is great experience. You are at home with the kids, and you are in charge. Babysitters must be able to prepare snacks, entertain the children, bathe them, and put them to bed. Some babysitting experience is definitely a plus.

1. Nanny experience. If you were really a nanny, you were in charge of children for a large portion of the day and took care of their needs as well as getting the children to their obligations, such as school or activities. Nannies are not occasional workers like babysitters, but usually work a regular full- or half-time schedule so that parents can work. Being a nanny is the most similar job to being an au pair and is impressive.

2. Camp counselors meet many different children and learn wholesome ways of entertaining them as well as appropriate ways of controlling them. Similar to counseling would be church program teachers, language teachers, coaches, and after- or before-school activity teachers. Counselors are usually overseen by a senior adult who is actually the person responsible for the children.

3. Volunteering at schools and nurseries is good experience for seeing children’s abilities at different ages. There is always a more senior person in charge running the show and telling you what to do next. This can be similar to being an au pair for a large family with a stay-at-home mom, but most au pairs are going to need to use their own judgment and be the one in charge most of the time. If you only have volunteer experience, consider doing some babysitting to show that you are trustworthy and have the good judgment needed to care for children on your own.

4. Caring for younger relatives. Most young people caring for younger relatives do it within the scope of having older adults around. However, this is a great way to develop childcare skills, and of seeing children develop.