THE AFS INTERCULTURAL EXPERIENCE
1. What is AFS and how do I stay involved while my child is away?
By now you know that AFS is dedicated to a more just and peaceful world through intercultural learning and exchange. Our activities, which are based on our core values of dignity, respect for differences, harmony, sensitivity and tolerance, include the exchange experience that your child is about to embark upon. Through this exchange program, your child will begin his / her global exploration and gain a stronger understanding of both Indian and international relations. At the same time, s/he will start to develop interpersonal and cross-cultural communication skills that will prove invaluable and help move the student closer to his / her personal, professional and academic goals.
In order for your child to fully realize this opportunity and grow as a cultural ambassador and young leader, the family also needs to support his/her growth during the year to come. We will share with you several handouts that demonstrate the intercultural learning and adjustment cycle your child will encounter during this exchange experience.
2.My child has “homework” in preparation for her / his experience. Do I?
Scholarship!Discuss with and help your child formulate her / his goals for the year ahead.These goals should encourage the student to rise to the occasion and the challenges of a year abroad, but should also be realistic enough to be achievable. Help them also map out possible concrete steps they can take to start achieving these goals.
HOST FAMILY PLACEMENTS
3. Who will the host family be? Please send full details about the host family.
Host families, similar to students, fill out a standard application forms and are interviewed by local representatives in each of the host communities. The process of matching a student and a family, plus a student and a school, does take time. Please be patient.
Once a student/ family match is made, the basic contact information is sent ahead to the student. But the complete host family profile usually comes later, as it often takes some more time for the host families to get together some parts of the complete family profile, like pictures pages, etc. This results in a delay in getting the complete family profiles sent off to the student.
This means that some students will get their host family information ahead of others. In a few cases, the students will not receive any word about their placement until up to the very last day before they depart from their home countries and that they may be assigned a welcome family.
What do host families’ abroad look like? Most families are nuclear (not extended or joint as in India) and comprise a mother,father, children and pets. However there are also single parent families,families with no kids, older parents with grown children, etc. Families come in all shapes and sizes and colours. They may be natives of the host countries or immigrants to that country. This is the true AFS family!
4. What is a welcome family?
A welcome host family is a family with whom those students who do not yet have a year-long host family will stay when they arrive in the USA, Europe Asia or South America stay while we confirm your permanent host family placement. If your child is assigned to a welcome family, this means s/he will have a trusted and screened host family upon arrival, but that, at the same time, we will also keep working on his or her year-long host family placement.However, because the time for your AFS experience is drawing near, we want you and your child to have information about where s/he will be before s/he leaves India.Sometimes a welcome host family becomes a permanent family – and that may happen here. We will let you know if this becomes the case.
If your child is assigned a welcome family, do not worry! Just like the child’s year-long host family, they will be excited to meet, learn more about and welcome him or her until the permanent family placement is confirmed. In fact,those students with welcome families will have even more new friends and"family" in the host country – and will know that many more people when they arrive. This is a practice of ours that has been tested and tried true for many years, as thousands of exchange students and AFS Returnees can attest to.
5. In which place (city / state / region) will my child be placed?
Students may be placed in any part of their host countries. Most are not placed in the biggest cities and they may be placed in rural areas as well. Until the host family and school placement are finalized, AFS will not be able to convey and information on a community or family to the prospective student.
6. Can any preference of city / state/ region be given by the candidate?
The answer to this is quite simply: No. AFS feels the placement in the right family and school is more important.
SCHOOL PLACEMENTS
7. What subjects will be available in the host schools?
Given the different school systems in the AFS countries and the decentralized nature of schools in the USA, it is impossible to give one answer to this question that applies to all. Two things should be noted in this context:
a) One of the main benefits of this sort of experience is the opportunity to explore subjects that are not typical in the home country schools.
b) There are typically enough choice and flexibility in the schools systems abroad to concentrate on or emphasize broad areas of interest, such as mathematics, science, languages, arts or even commerce in many high schools today.
8. What about arrangements / assurances with the school / institution in India for continuity of studies and returning to studies after returning from the AFS year?
As has been conveyed to all student applicants/ families/ schools from the very beginning, the above is the responsibility of the student and his or her family. We encourage everyone to consider that all around the world, students decide in favor of lengthening their time in secondary school by one year in order to take part in an AFS program.
Students should request their host high school to give them a copy of the transcripts(marks/ grade sheets) courses and syllable before returning to India. This will help the Indian schools in deciding about placement upon return.
9. What about academic transcripts (list of courses, mark sheets)? A diploma?
Students should take these with them from their Indian schools; this will help in choice of subjects at the host school. Carry the mark sheets listing the courses taken in the last year (if 10th standard then carry the preliminary marks sheets from10th plus the finals from 9th, not just the Board Exams results). Again, before returning to India, students should request their host school to arrange a copy of the syllable, grades/marks and evaluation; this will help the Indian school in re-entry placement.
Students should not ask for a diploma from their high schools. As they have not done their entire education there, a diploma is not given. If the student has attended school regularly and performed as per expectations, AFS India will issue a‘certificate of participation’ upon return and at your request.
10. Can my child complete her / his Indian studies while in the host country? (Can I send her / his Indian lessons to her/ him in the host country?)
Many years of experience have taught us that this is not an advisable approach and in fact may contribute to a failing experience. Rather, allow your child to acculturate and learn from the experience by truly being in the host family, school and community with minimal distraction from “back home.”
CONTACT & COMMUNICATIONS
11. How will we be in touch with our child throughout the year?
AFS has an established Chain of Communications so as to ensure that everyone is informed of what is happening. This chain goes from student to host family or school to chapter/local coordinator to the national office of the hosting country to the national office of the sending country (India) to the natural family.
12. Can I visit my child?
Visits to your child in the host country are not encouraged. If you want to visit your child, it is allowed only after February 2007 and requires prior written permission from AFS. If you have relatives that want to visit the student, again it is not advised or allowed soon after arrival, and the relatives should check with the local AFS office in the hosting country. Over-enthusiastic relatives can be perceived as ‘interfering’ by a host family that is trying to help the student. Please remember that the student’s adjustment to his new family and community are our foremost consideration in this case.
Also it is not appropriate for the student to leave their host family and visit your relatives/friends on key holidays like Christmas/Diwali/Eid/Hannukah, etc, as sharing these holidays with the host family are key to the intercultural experience.
TRAVEL
13. What do we do about the visas and what are the details of my child’s travel?
We will be giving you instructions shortly about the visa applications. Please have you child check his/ her email regularly for notification on this very important matter.
The air tickets are being booked and we will inform you of the actual departure date by email soon. The departures will be from Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore, depending on the country of destination
14. May I go with my child to the airport?
All parents/ family are to say goodbye to their children before the students join the Gateway orientation. Families may not to come to the airport, as the students will go from the bus directly into the airport. We also kindly request parents not to call the students during this orientation. No cell phones and or laptops should betaken to the orientations and to the host countries.
We know this is an emotional time for both students and parents, but our AFS experience has taught us that this “clean break” is easier and better for the students. Please say goodbye before putting your child on the train and/or dropping him or her at the Gateway camp or meet.
15. What happens when my child arrives in the host country and how will I know s/he is there?
Once students reach their host country, the national office in the hosting country will inform the AFS India office. We would like one parent in each zone or city to volunteer to be the person to whom we can pass the message and who will be the phone tree and call all other parents in that city.
Once students reach their families they will call you or email you. Please remember that the students get very busy and excited upon arrival at their host families, after the first information about their arrival then no news or a few lines is good news!
16.What luggage restrictions are there?
Per student: One check-bag: Weight: 20 kg; Size: the sum of the three dimensions of one bag shall not exceed 158 cm plus one carry-on bag. You may have read of different guidelines by the airlines, but because of the conditions that apply to the students’ tickets, these are the AFS standard weights. Also note that students will have to carry all bags themselves for considerable distances at their arrival airports(many foreign airports do not provide free trolleys)and at the camps. Also if they have domestic connecting flights, any excess baggage will be charged to the student.
Carry-on bag limitations: Your one piece of hand luggage may not
be larger than 55 x 40 x 20 cm and may not weigh more than 8 kg. Not allowed in carry-on baggage are any items that may cause injury:
weapons and items that may be used as weapons which can discharge a projectile, or look-alike weapons, Pointed and sharp items, like scissors or tweezers or nail files. And no matches or lighters.
We suggest that each student has a neck pouch with zip or Velcro closure for his /her passport and US$100 cash for emergency purposes. If a part of the visa is a sheet of paper or envelope stapled to the passport, fold it and put it in the pouch. Do not detach it!
Please make sure to make 2 or 3 photocopies of the passport, visa page and final immunizations records and that your child keeps them in different places: 1 in check-in bag, 1 in carry-on bag.
SUPPORT
17. What other orientation will my child receive?
In addition to arrival orientations in the host country, there will be multiple Gateway departure orientations at the day of departure.
We will revert with the details and the logistics of these Gateways by email and program information will be distributed when available, prior to the camp.
18. What contacts will students have with AFS during their year stay?
To help students adjust, cope and get the maximum benefit from their program, in addition to the host family (who also will have had an orientation on hosting students), each student will have
·A local representative or volunteer in the community
·Access to the AFS head office in the host country
19. How do parents who are missing their children cope?
Please remember it is completely normal to miss your child while s/he is away! (And you child will naturally miss you no matter how wonderful his or her host family.) To cope with these feelings, become an AFS volunteer in your city or community. Or your family might want to consider hosting a student from abroad. Please contact the AFS India to become a volunteer or to host.
PRACTICALITIES
20.What rules must my child follow?
In addition to the rules spelled out in the Participation Agreement, your child has or will receive rules for his / her host country
21.Are there any more forms or papers that need to be completed?
The Visa Application Form: you will receive instructions from us shortly on this.The process is different for different host countries.
The Participation Agreement will be sent to you in duplicate. Please sign both copies and return both to the AFS India office. We will then sign and return one copy to you.
Medical Form Addendum/ Immunizations: all immunizations are to be completed prior to departure and this form is to be signed and stamped by your doctor and carried to the host country.
22. What about health insurance?
All students going on AFS program are covered for health.
22.What about pocket money in the host country?
For AFS students:AFS recommends an equivalent to about USD $100 per month for personal expenses (Clothes, shoes, magazines, games, etc.). Students may take this with them as travelers’ cheques or may have access to such an amount via ATM or a credit card.
Each student, regardless of destination,is to carry $100 in USD or EUR in cash as emergency money at the time of departure. And a reminder that students should not have a lot of extra spending money (or cell phone or laptop), as it may not be appropriate to the host family’s income level.
24. Should my child bring a gift for the host family and siblings?
A small gift is nice. It should be something “Indian” and not so heavy or expensive. It is the thought that counts. It is a good idea to pack some personal items that “illustrate” life at home.Like photos of family, home, school and friends in India. The host family will want to know about the student’s life in India.
25. Any other tips for my child?
Throughout your child"s stay, s/he will be given the opportunity to reflect on the exchange experience and the changes that s/he is undergoing. To enhance this, if the student likes to write, encourage her or him to keep a diary. Photos (consider your child"s bringing a camera), drawings or magazine image collages may be for those who are more visual. It will be very interesting for the student to go back and read and follow her or his own progress in intercultural development through the AFS year.
26. What if my question was not answered here?
Please contact an AFS volunteer in your Local Chapter.
