VALLEY COLLEGE : U.S., Norway Exchange Teachers

For the last two semesters, a foreign exchange teacher--rather than an exchange student--has been learning about life in the United States at Valley College in Van Nuys.

Jostein Selvikvag, who is from Norway, has been teaching various English classes at the Van Nuys campus since last fall when he exchanged jobs and homes with Valley English instructor Jacqueline Stark.

The only thing that the two have kept of their own is their salaries.

But that suits Selvikvag fine. His family can afford to eat out here, he said--something foreign to them in Norway because of the higher prices.

He said he is amazed that Americans have health insurance and cars, and that “the prices are reasonable. . . . It’s very easy to live.”

Selvikvag and Stark are swapping jobs under the Fulbright Exchange, a program named for former Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas that was established after World War II when the United States wanted Europeans to come here to do research. The teacher exchange is only one aspect of the program.

A 1972 graduate of the University of Bergen in Norway, Selvikvag has a degree that is the American equivalent to being between a master’s degree and a doctorate. He and his wife, a nurse taking the year off, are here with their 13-year-old daughter, a junior high school student. They have a 21-year-old daughter who remained in Norway.

Selvikvag said he and his family found living in Los Angeles a little different than he expected because of the recent riots, floods and earthquakes.

“We felt a little scared, unsettled,” during the riots, he said. “We watched TV and could smell the smoke.”

During February’s unusual flooding in the Sepulveda Basin and other areas, Stark’s house flooded twice. “But we saved Jackie Stark’s carpets,” he said.

Getting used to his students proved easy, he said, because many of them are in English as a second language classes.

Selvikvag described many differences in educational systems of the two countries. In Norway, he teaches Norwegian, English and linguistics at a gymnasium (a high school preparing students for academic studies).

He said Norwegian schools emphasize critical and analytical thinking much more than American schools.

Selvikvag will return to Norway in July, but said he wouldn’t mind remaining in this country another year and will probably return one day. However, he said, if he moved to the U.S. permanently, he would find a smaller community in which to live.