After a quarter of a century, Mal Brooks is wandering back in from foreign territory.

As an instrumental part of the Rotary Student Exchange, including a long tenure as chairman, Brooks has helped send fifty-seven students overseas to twenty-two countries. Cooperstown has hosted forty-one students from twenty-one countries since the program's inception in 1964.

"It's a true exchange program," Brooks said. "We send students to countries that send students here so it's more of an even exchange."

There is a screening process to which students are subjected, Brooks said. The process mainly involved questions so the students' responses can be considered as they seek a spot in the program. Having a true exchange doesn't guarantee the safety of students, but it does add a level of safety, Brooks said.

The tried and true rule of staying in another country, Brooks said, is not to get involved in politics.

"Thats the first thing students need to be told," Brooks said.

Brooks' family has benefited from his involvement. His daughter went to Santa Cruz, Bolivia in 1976, five years after her family hosted a Japanese exchange student, Hiroko, for three months. Hiroko recently visited the Brooks' with her own family.

"She still remembers the chore wheel we used for the kids," Brooks said. At the time, the family lived in the Clark Sports Center, where Brooks was the director from 1968-1986.

"Students are to be treated like members of the family, fed and taken care of. They are not a servant, not a guest," Brooks said.

A student's family is responsible for the expenses associated with the exchange, Brooks said, and when a host family accepts a student they take care of meals and lodging. Part of the goal of the program is to immerse students in a new language and culture.

"They are little ambassadors," Brooks said. "They represent not only the Rotary, but their families, school districts and culture."

Paula Lind is a German foreign exchange student living with Rich Brown and his family in Cooperstown.

The experience, Brown said, has been wonderful because "Paula is a top shelf human being. Paula being Paula makes this great."

Stephanie Brown, 17, hit it off with Lind right away.

Brooks and his family have gone to Finland three times to visit a family they met through the program, and he arranged it so that a Finnish doctor could study a surgical technique at Bassett Hospital during a stay in Cooperstown. Now, that doctor is one of the only ones in his homeland performing the surgery.

Three generations of Brooks' family, his wife, daughter and granddaughter, recently went to Bolivia, twenty-five years after his daughter studied there, to visit.

"Things get harder to do as you get older," said Brooks of his retirement. "And now we go to Florida."