As an AFS participant, you are a Cultural Ambassador, sharing your country and culture with your host family and community. As such, the way you represent yourself as an AFS Participant and as a citizen of the U.S. will have an impact beyond your immediate connections. You will simultaneously be learning about others and teaching others about you. You will be a student and a teacher. You are sure to have many reasons for going abroad and many goals you wish to achieve while abroad. AFS has some goals for you as well—these goals may even overlap with your own!
- Increase your awareness and appreciation for your host country/culture
- Gain foreign language and cultural behavioral skills
- Have a greater awareness of the U.S. and its culture
- Enhance your understanding of cultural difference and sense of a “world community”
- Be more adaptable
- Be more aware of opportunities available to you
- Improve critical thinking and conflict resolution skills
- Cultivate empathy and understanding for differences around you
- Suspending judgement and developing lenses for seeking deeper understanding
- Develop greater independence and responsibility for yourself
- Be more confident in your decisions
We hope that through the AFS experience you gain the skills and knowledge that help you become an active global citizen that contribuate to a more peaceful world.
Learning by Doing
You have taken the bold step to commit yourself to learning through experience. This is a very different kind of learning than reading about different countries and cultures and studying languages in school. By actively becoming a member of your host community and family, you learn on a deeper level about a different culture, yourself, and your own culture, as well as current issues facing different countries around the world.
Taking it Further
As a member of your host community, your conduct will also reflect on your host family and AFS in your host country. Be proud to be an active part of such a network.