How to become an au pair

After I decided to become an au pair, a friend told me about the organisation "Cultural Care Au Pair". On their website I ordered some information brochures for free and they arrived a few days later. Cultural Care invited me to an information event on November 2nd (2014), which convinced me that Cultural Care was the right organisation for me. On November 16th I attended an au pair workshop where I learned more about my rights and duties as an au pair in America. By December 2014 my application was accepted and the matching process started.

My first match was on January 1st and it was a lovely family with two little boys. I read their application and decided to arrange a skype date with them because everything seemed to be perfect. So, I skyped with them on January 2nd and they were extremely kind and I knew I wanted to become their au pair! On January 5th my hostmom called me and told me that I'd be their au pair! I was extremely relieved and happy!

Program fee

After accepting the final match, I had to pay the program fee of 1600€. The fee includes the flight, several insurances and a travel month at the end of my au pair year.

Payment and working conditions

Cultural Care will guarantee you a weekly payment of about 200$. Furthermore, you won't be allowed to work more than 45 hours a week. You'll also get two weeks of paid vacation and you don't have to pay for room and board.

Stuff you need to get:

-health evaluation

-international driver's license

-valid passport

-valid visa

My Au Pair Courses

After your final match, you'll be asked to do an online workshop called "My Au Pair Courses". You'll have to read some texts and watch videos about childcare and how to behave as an au pair in America. Afterwards, you'll be asked questions about those texts and videos. But don't worry! The questions are very easy to answer. Unfortunately, it takes several hours to finish the au pair courses!

So, be patient and finish them whenever you have the time to! And you can always review what you have learned.

Visa

Cultural Care will send you a lot of helpful papers with information about 'how to apply for a Visa'. First of all, you have to sign in on an internet platform, where you'll get the DS-160 certificate. You'll have to pay the Visa fee (mine was about 144€) first, before you'll be able to sign in on the website ustraveldocs.com to arrange a date for the application interview at the American Embassy.

My Visa appointment was on May 29th at 9:15am at the American consulate in Berlin. I was there by 9 o'clock (it's always better to be too early than too late) and I left all my stuff outside, where my friends waited for me. A police man took me to the security check and after that I had to hand my documents to a friendly, english-speaking man at a counter. He told me to take a seat (there where about 50 chairs, where a lot of other people were already waiting). Then, I had to wait for about 30 minutes to be paged to identify my fingerprints. Afterwards, I had to wait for another 30 minutes and was finally paged to the interview counter, where a german-speaking man asked me three questions:

1. "What would you like to do in the USA?"

2. "Where will you live?"

3. "Have you ever been in the USA?"

That's it! He told me that my Visa was accepted and that the documents will be sent to me in a few days.

So for your appointment you need:

-your passport

-the DS-160 certificate

-the DS-2019 certificate

-a SEVIS payment acknowledgement

-a photo for your Visa (in case you didn't upload it on your DS-160 certificate)

-an evidence of enough funds to pay a flight back (I didn't need it)

Training School

Cultural Care will send you to a Training School, which is located on Long Island, NYC. You'll spend your first week in the USA there and go on a trip to New York City. All au pairs arrive on Mondays and leave on Fridays.

The staff is extremely sweet and polite: When you first get there, they welcome you and there's a pizza dinner the night you arrive. As I arrived there in August, it was very hot. We could hardly sleep in our beds because of the heat (my room was on the 3rd floor and I had to share it with 5 German and Austrian girls). After the second day, the bathrooms were not clean anymore and the showers were sometimes cold, sometimes way too hot. The WiFi connection was only good when everyone else was sleeping or at the Cafeteria. We didn't live in luxury, but we survived... Nevertheless, the campus is very big and the buildings are quite impressive.

From Tuesday to Thursday there will be different classes, which every au pair has to attend. For instance, a communication workshop and the American Red Cross Certification are on the schedule. You'll learn some interesting things about working as an au pair and about the American culture. Most of the classes are unfortunately pretty boring and in contrast to the bedrooms, the classrooms are freezing cold.

The highlight is of course the New York City trip on Thursday. It includes a guided tour on the bus and about one and a half hour of free time. I was very relieved that my host family paid for the NYC trip (50$) for me, so that I only had to pay for the Rockefeller Center ticket (25$). I also got the pink Cultural Care bag, an "I love NYC" shirt and a few other little gifts from my host family.

On Friday every au pair will leave the Training School and travel to their host families.

I arrived on August 17th and left on August 21st by bus. The bus was very small for the amount of au pairs and bags it had to carry... We drove about 7h to the Vienna Bus Stop at Tyson's Corner, where my host family picked me up.

Rematch!

If your host family and you don't get along, Cultural Care will send you into rematch. This means that you have two weeks to find a new host family, otherwise you'll have to go back to your home country - on your own expense! Your LCC should guide you through this time. Sadly, my LCC was not helpful at all. My host family and I didn't get along anymore after almost nine months of living together. I never thought it would happen to me, but sadly it did: We had to do a rematch. I was very surprised how fast the process was. Within one week, I moved out, got into the rematch process, found a new family and moved to their house! It was a crazy time, but I'm so happy I did it!

The transition process is very nerve-wracking and exhausting, but if you have your friends helping you out (like I had) you'll make it through this hard time. At first, I was always scared to take the step and go into rematch because it just takes so much effort, but in the end I can really say that it was the best decision I could've made.

So, if you don't feel comfortable in your host family anymore, don't hesitate - do a rematch before it's too late!

Final Match!

My first host family owns a house in Springfield, Virginia.

First get-together with my host family

My host family travels around a lot because my host dad works for the Air Force as a pilot. From 2012 to June 2015 they lived in Germany because my host mom is German. According to that, I was able to meet my host family for the first time in February 2015! I was very nervous, but in the end it was extremely relieving to get to know my future family before leaving my home country. The get-together confirmed my assumption that this was the right family for me! We decided to meet again, if it's possible.

Virginia

I spent almost nine months of my year in Springfield (VA), which is pretty close to Washington D.C. Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is located in the South Atlantic region of the United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" due to its status as a former dominion of the English Crown, and "Mother of Presidents" due to the many U.S. presidents having been born there.

The capital of the Commonwealth is Richmond; Virginia Beach is the most populous city, and Fairfax County is the most populous political subdivision.

Rematch!

My new host family owns a big house in Moosic, Pennsylvania.

It's such a lovely neighborhood. Moosic is right in the mountains, so it's a popular place to ski and spend a nice winter vacation. The houses are a lot bigger than in Springfield because Moosic is not so close to a big city.

Pennsylvania

I spent my last 3 months in Moosic (PA), which is about 2h from Philadelphia. The state Pennsylvania is one of the 13 originial founding states of the United States; it was originally founded in 1681 as a result of a royal land grant to William Penn, the son of the state's namesake. It was the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, on December 12, 1787. Independence Hall, where the United States Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution were drafted, is located in the state's largest city of Philadelphia. During the American Civil War, the Battle of Gettysburg was fought in the south central region of the state.