The Team

Ev Widarski

For the past twelve years, Ev has been involved with personally housing (over 20 students) and in the past seven years, she has professionally placed (more than 1000+) international students. Her vast background in corporate management, particularly in project management, has honed her skills to effectively manage everything from small to very large group projects. As an international coordinator, Ev has managed full year students as well as short-term tour groups. She has developed strong working relationships with over 500 host families, many schools and principals, and several community organizations. And she has a natural ability for working with youth.

Ev’s goal is to find a good home for every student and to facilitate a positive experience for all involved. International education and the sharing of cultural experiences are important to the integrity of her work. Her experience and in-depth knowledge of Homestay along with a positive, caring attitude and a proven successful track record ensures that as hosts, you have a strong supporter in a host coordinator.

Ev also is very involved in her community, and has been with the Cambridge Kiwanis for the past 4 years, and is on their Board of Directors, she also is on several other volunteer Boards within the community.

Linda Nakashima

Linda and her husband Chuck started working with Waterloo Region Student Placement during the summer of 2010. They had been hosting Japanese students for over 5 years.

After being made redundant from a position as Office Manager, when the sales office she had worked at for 28 years closed its doors, she ventured out into the world of self-employment. Fortunately for her she got connected with a great networking group in Cambridge and once Ev Widarski gave her short presentation on hosting and the rest as they say was history.

With many years of office management and extensive computer skills this new work environment connecting with hundreds of young students from around the world and communicating with terrific host families has become an enjoyable and rewarding transition for Linda.

Chuck McCrossan

Chuck has always had a passion for computers and helping people.  Due to working in a factory his entire career, he could not use these skills effectively until the factory closed down.  After having hosted Japanese students several years he came on board in the capacity of looking after families who also host.  He states that he has “found his passion” and works diligently in performing computer work and caring for both the host families and their students.  Chuck had his biggest thrill when he travelled to Yokohama, Japan where he met some of the students he had hosted in the past.  He brought back with him a better understanding of how a student might feel coming over to Canada from Japan because he did not know the Japanese language so he became “the student”  from Canada.  Chuck feels that we can all learn from other cultures and this attitude has become his specialty.