Cecily Sawyer-Harmon, homestay mom, instinctively

On the green wall of her office on Academy Street, nestled among the oil paintings of daffodils and irises, is a small plaque that reads, “Follow your instincts.”

	Homestay mom Cecily Sawyer-Harmon with ELI student Juliette Rivero

Cecily Sawyer-Harmon, who now coordinates the university’s Faculty and Staff Assistance Program, once followed her husband to Liberia, where she became assistant director of social services for the entire country.

The social worker’s father-in-law was Liberia’s ambassador to the United Nations, and Cecily was invited to receptions where she met heads of state and diplomats, including President Nixon and U.N. Secretary General U Thant.

Fast-forward 30 years to 2003. Cecily, now living in Newark and recently divorced, follows a different instinct. The mother of three grown sons, the empty nester decides to try ELI’s homestay program.

She knew she wanted to host female students, since she’d never had a daughter. And if they were a little bit older, she thought, they might provide a good source of camaraderie. Cecily also felt her own background might help dispel some apprehensions and misconceived ideas international students might have of Americans of color.

Her instincts were right.

“It’s been wonderful,” she said, lifting her desk pad and removing a letter from one of her homestay students, a teacher from South Korea.

“Dear Antee [sic],” it reads, “I enjoyed living with you. You were a good host mom. Thanks to you I came to understand African-Americans better. It was a great experience for me.”

Since 2003, Cecily has been homestay mom to four international students at ELI, three from South Korea and one from Colombia. It’s hard to say who enjoys the relationship more.

"I take them to New York, and they visit my in-laws from Liberia in Delaware. And we cook together,” she explains.

“We’re all on the same wavelength.We all want to watch our figures and not gain weight.”

Cecily has become particularly close to her latest ELI homestay student, Juliette Rivero from Colombia, who’s stayed the longest in her home.

“She’s like a daughter to me,” she said.

With Juliette, Cecily shared some of her grandmother’s Jamaican recipes. The dishes—which consist of rice, beans, cassava and plantains—are similar to Colombian fare. Juliette also joined Cecily’s hiking club and accompanied her at 5:30 in the morning to the university’s fitness center. There they usually ran into the same dozen women, who have come to refer to themselves as the “spider women group.”

The name derives from the initiation each member must undergo. To initiate Juliette, Cecily enlisted the help of Juliette’s friend and fellow ELI student, Berlin Londoño.

“I put a plastic spider on her bed,” she explained.

“But Juliette can’t see without her glasses. Then Berlin told her, ‘You forgot your glasses.’ When she put them on, she spotted the spider and screamed and ran out of the room.” For Juliette, the practical joke only reinforced their strong relationship.

“My experience with Cecily was wonderful,” Juliette said in an email communication from the University of Arkansas, where she is continuing her studies.

“She helped me all the time, and we could share many things about our lives. She became my American mom.”