international youth change organization

AFS Intercultural Programs ( or AFS, in the first place the American Field Service ) is an international youth exchange arrangement. It consists of over 50 autonomous, nonprofit organization organizations, each with its own network of volunteers, professionally staff offices, volunteer dining table of directors and web site. In 2015, 12,578 students traveled abroad on an AFS cultural central program, between 99 countries. [ 1 ] The U.S.-based partner, AFS-USA, sends more than 1,100 U.S. students overseas and places external students with more than 2,300 U.S. families each year. More than 424,000 people have gone overseas with AFS and over 100,000 former AFS students live in the U.S. [ 2 ]

history of the AFS Intercultural Programs [edit ]

WWI [edit ]

Shot down German plane from AFS Lewis Burwell account personal letters from the front

The remains of two ambulances destroyed by german shell-fire bring to Paris 21 ambulances in the yard at 21 Rue Raynouard in Paris The american english Ambulance Field Service convoy near Dombasle-en-Argonne in 1917 A. Piatt Andrew, director of the Field Service and Major Church, U. S. A., visiting in Champagne., film director of the Field Service and Major Church, U. S. A., visiting in Champagne. When war broke out in 1914, the american Colony of Paris organized an “ ambulance ” [ 3 ] —the french term for a impermanent military hospital—just as it had done in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 when the “ american Ambulance ” had been under tents set up near the Paris home of its founder, the lionize Paris-American dentist, Dr. Thomas W. Evans. [ 4 ] The “ american Ambulance ” of 1914 took over the premises of the bare Lycée Pasteur in the suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine—and was run by the nearby american Hospital of Paris. The volunteer drivers of 1914 found themselves behind the wheels of motorized, not horse-driven, vehicles : Model-Ts, purchased from the nearby Ford plant in Levallois-Perret. In the fall of 1914, when the war front moved away from Paris, the american english Ambulance set up an frontier settlement in Juilly and sent out detach units of unpaid drivers to serve colloquially with the british and belgian armies in the north. [ 5 ] In early 1915, one of those drivers, A. Piatt Andrew, was appointed “ Inspector of Ambulances ” by Robert Bacon, head of the american Ambulance and one of Andrew ‘s colleagues from the Taft Administration. The newly appointed examiner toured the ambulance sections of Northern France and learned that the american volunteers were bored with alleged “ bus exercise, ” transporting wounded soldiers from railheads to hospitals far back from the front lines. french united states army policy prohibited foreign nationals from traveling into battle zones. [ 6 ] In March 1915, Andrew met with Captain Aimé Doumenc, read/write head of the french Army Automobile Service and pleaded his case for the american volunteers. They desired above all, he said, “ to pick up the wounded from the front lines…, to look risk squarely in the side ; in a parole, to mingle with the soldiers of France and to share their destine ! ” [ 7 ] Doumenc agreed to give Andrew a trial. The success of Section Z was immediate and consuming, and by April 15, 1915, the french create american Ambulance Field Service operating under french Army command. [ 8 ] [ 9 ] This marked the conventional begin of american Ambulance Field Service, three units of which made their cross off during battles in northern France, the Champagne, Verdun and the Vosges. [ 10 ] By the summer of 1916, the Field Service severed its ties with the american Ambulance and moved its operations from hamper quarters in Neuilly to Paris, onto the roomy grounds of the Delessert château at 21 rue Raynouard in the Passy area of Paris. [ 11 ] There, it grew quickly over the adjacent year, continuing to provide “ sanitary sections ” to the french Army, while besides serving as a recruitment reference of combat pilots for the newly formed Escadrille Lafayette, [ 12 ] one of whose premier movers, Dr. Edmund L. Gros, was the Field Service ‘s in-house doctor. When the United States entered the war in April 1917, the french Army successfully appealed to the Field Service for drivers for its military transport sections [ 13 ] —and sol, no long limited to medical transportation, the administration renamed itself the “ american english Field Service ”, therefore establishing today ‘s long-familiar acronym, “ AFS ”. Before the AFS was absorbed into the much larger, federate U.S. Army Ambulance Service, [ 14 ] it had numbered more than 2500 volunteers, including some 800 drivers of french military transport trucks. It had actively recruited its drivers from the campuses of american colleges and universities, promoting esprit de corps by creating units with volunteers from the lapp schools. All financed their own uniforms and fare to France where they worked under the lapp conditions as french ambulance drivers—with the same pay—and often found themselves serving under highly dangerous missions on the Front. By the end of the war, some 127 men who had served with the AFS were killed and a celebrated number of individuals and units earned the Croix de Guerre and the Médaille de Guerre for their heroic verse actions as drivers. [ 15 ] other volunteer ambulance corps served the french Army as “ alien sanitary sections ” during World War I. The first was Henry Harjes ’ “ Formation ” units under the American Red Cross, [ 16 ] followed by Richard Norton ‘s american Volunteer Motor-Ambulance Corps, [ 17 ] organized in London under the St. John ‘s Ambulance ( the British Red Cross ). by and by, both would merge —under the American Red Cross—as the “ Norton-Harjes ”. In the summer and drop of 1917, when all the volunteer ambulance services were invited to join the new U.S. Army Ambulance Service, Norton ‘s units just disbanded, while Harjes ’, under the American Red Cross, moved into Italy where they would subsequently serve under the USAAS. once the Americans entered the war, many drivers joined fight units, both french and american, serving as officers in a assortment of assignments, notably in air coerce and artillery units. At the same time, a big share of volunteers signed up for the military, thereafter members of USAAS units, but remaining identified with their AFS past—a past kept alive through the knead of HQ, calm at 21 repent Raynouard, where a Bulletin [ 18 ] was published and where visiting ambulance drivers could find impermanent lodgings and meals .

WWI Publications [edit ]

The young AFS drivers came from “ big families in the States, ” and had attended, or were even attending, one of about a hundred outstanding colleges or universities around the country. besides represented were a smaller group from America ‘s professional class : doctors, lawyers, architects, painters, brokers, businessmen, poets and writers. [ 19 ] [ 20 ] [ 21 ] This literate group produced many letters, diaries, journals, and even poetry. The AFS collected many of these writings into Friends of France, published in 1916. The Service used this volume to recruit more volunteers to the “ gloriously exciting and grandly humanitarian ” exploit of an ambulancier on the western Front. [ 22 ] besides published in 1916, Ambulance Number 10, by Leslie Buswell, was composed of the generator ‘s letters bet on to the States. Buswell went on to assist Henry Sleeper in the AFS ‘s recruit and fund-raise offices in Boston. other literary “ ambulanciers ” brought their letters and journals and memoirs to american publishers in the coming years. William Yorke Stevenson produced To The Front in a Flivver in 1917, stayed on in France after mobilization, and composed From “Poilu” to “Yank” in 1918. [ 23 ] [ 24 ] Robert Imbrie published Behind the Wheel of a War Ambulance in 1918, as did Julien Bryan with Ambulance 464: Encore des Blesses [ 25 ] [ 26 ] The AFS recruits who joined the Service in late jump 1917, after Congress ‘s announcement of war, were greeted by Piatt Andrew with a request : Would they forego ambulance driving for trucking supplies to the battlefront ? Eight hundred AFS recruits joined the dray service, including John Kautz, who published Trucking to the Trenches in 1918. [ 27 ] After the war the Field Service produced three hefty volumes of writings from numerous AFS alumni, including excerpts from the previously published books above. [ 28 ]

Between the wars [edit ]

Following the Great War, the AFS became sponsors for the french Fellowships [ 29 ] —graduate student scholarships for cogitation in France and in the US—which were ultimately administered by the Institute of International Education and were precedents for the Fulbright Foundation exchanges. AFS besides created an association for its veterans, publishing a bulletin, [ 30 ] organizing reunions and contributing a wing to firm its memorabilia at the Museum of franco-american Cooperation in Blérancourt, France. [ 31 ]

WWII [edit ]

When World War II broke out, AFS reorganized its ambulance service, [ 32 ] sending units first to France and then to the british Armies in North Africa, Italy, India-Burma and with the Free French for the final examination drive from southerly France to Germany.

Postwar [edit ]

In September 1946, Stephen Galatti, [ 33 ] president of the united states of AFS, established the American Field Service International Scholarships. During the 1947–48 school year, the first gear students came from ten-spot countries including Czechoslovakia, Estonia, France, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Syria. Students participating had to be nominated by their teachers .

modern day [edit ]

New Mexico Western Life Camp, AFS New Mexico Area Team ( NMAT ) As of 2014, there are over 55 AFS organizations worldwide serving over 80 different countries, providing exchange opportunities for over 13,000 students and teachers per annum. AFS is one of the largest volunteer-based organizations of its kind in the world with more than 440,000 volunteers global and more than 5,000 in the U.S. Tens of thousands of volunteers and a small staff make the AFS plan happen cosmopolitan. AFS volunteers are both young and honest-to-god, busy professionals and retirees, and students and teachers. AFS provides development and trail opportunities for volunteers. AFS volunteers help in many areas including facilitating the AFS mission in the local community and schools by finding and interview students and families. further involvement includes serving as a contact person for an AFS student, organizing fund raising events, and arranging activities for AFS students. As a volunteer-driven arrangement, AFS depends on donations of time to implement and monitor the delivery of programs. luminary exception in the AFS network is its presence in China. here AFS offers an outbound long-run student exchange platform since 1997 and an inbound program since 2001. These programs however, are run and administrated by the China Education Association for International Exchange ( CEAIE ), an organization focusing on teacher exchanges that was founded by the chinese Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of Education. [ 34 ]

statement of purpose [edit ]

AFS is an international, voluntary, non-governmental, non-profit organization that provides intercultural learning opportunities to help people develop the cognition, skills and understanding needed to create a more just and peaceful populace. [ 35 ]

celebrated AFS Ambulance Corps volunteers [edit ]

Notable AFS exchange students [edit ]

AFS-USA, Inc. ( alias, AFS-USA ) is the AFS partner organization in the United States and is a cross-file 501 ( hundred ) ( 3 ). approximately 1,100 participants go abroad with AFS-USA annually. Over 2,300 international AFS students from AFS-USA partner countries are hosted in the U.S. annually. AFS-USA is supported by a tennessean foundation of over 5,000. Students aged 15 – 18 may partake in AFS-USA programs, while Gap Programs are available for individuals over 18 years of age on a gap year .

AFS-USA Public Diplomacy Initiatives [edit ]

Public Diplomacy Initiatives at AFS-USA crack support for international students to study in the United States and for U.S. students to study abroad via entire funded scholarships by grant-making foundations or by the Educational and Cultural Affairs Bureau of the U.S. Department of State .

Congress Bundestag [edit ]

The Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange Program ( CBYX ) was launched in 1983 by the U.S. Congress and the german Parliament. AFS presently provides 50 merit-based, fully scholarships for U.S. students and 60 scholarships for german participants. In Germany it is called the “ Parlamentarisches Patenschafts Programm ” ( PPP ) and over the years the german authorities have made many efforts to present this as their “ own program ”. not merely AFS Germany but all competitors are more or less behind-the-scene avail providers so people may not recognized who is doing this broadcast in Germany .

National Security Language Initiative for Youth ( NSLI-Y ) [edit ]

The National Security Language Initiative for Youth ( NSLI-Y ) program is part of a broader government-wide presidential first step that prepares american citizens to be leaders in a ball-shaped world. NSLI-Y encourages a life of language survey and cultural agreement by providing more than 600 in full funded scholarships to american high school students. In 2018, NSLI-Y offers academic scholarships to learn Arabic, Mandarin Chinese, Hindi, Indonesian, Korean, Persian ( Tajiki ), russian, and Turkish through summer and year-long programs in China, Morocco, Oman, Jordan, India, Korea, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Taiwan, Indonesia, and other countries around the world. [ 39 ]

Future Leaders Exchange ( FLEX ) [edit ]

The Future Leaders Exchange ( FLEX ) program originated in the FREEDOM Support Act, which was sponsored by U.S. Senator Bill Bradley and was passed by Congress in 1992. FLEX provides broad merit-based scholarships to students from the countries of the erstwhile Soviet Union .

Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study ( YES ) [edit ]

Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study ( YES ) was initiated by The Department of State in the consequence of Sept. 11. It aims to build bridges of understanding between Americans and people in countries with meaning Muslim populations.

AFS-USA Scholarships [edit ]

AFS-USA awards more than $ 3 million in fiscal aid and scholarships to students each year. More than 40 % of AFS-USA participants receive some form of fiscal aid each year either need-based, merit-based or both. A partial derivative list of scholarships and fiscal help :

  • Global Leaders is the primary AFS scholarship program, offering partial need and merit-based scholarships to qualified applicants.
  • Faces of America is AFS-USA’s signature diversity program and makes it possible for high school students from underserved communities to receive scholarship awards to study abroad in more than 23 countries around the world.
  • AFS Family Scholarships are awards are given to applicants who are former host family members, returnees, children of returnees, and of descendants of AFS Ambulance Drivers.
  • The Yoshi Hattori Memorial Scholarship is a merit-based scholarship is designed to promote intercultural understanding and peace, and was created in memory of Yoshi Hattori, an AFS Exchange Student to the U.S. from Japan.
  • The Toshiyuki Tanaka American Embassy Scholarship is a need-based and merit-based scholarship awarded through the Pacific Affairs Section (PAS) of the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo and the generosity of Mr. Toshiyuki Tanaka.

References [edit ]

  • “Friends of France: the Field Service of the American Ambulance,” described by its members. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1916.
  • “History of the American Field Service in France,” as told by its members, vols. 1–3, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1920.
  • Hansen, Arlen. “Gentlemen Volunteers.” NY: Arcade Publishing, 1996, 2011.
  • Bryan, Julien H. “Ambulance 464: Encore des Blesses.” NY: Macmillan Co., 1918.
  • Leslie Buswell. “Ambulance No. 10: Personal Letters from the Front.” NY: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1916.
  • Imbrie, Robert Whitney. “Behind the Wheel of a War Ambulance.” NY: Robert McBride and Co., 1918.
  • Kautz, John Iden. Trucking to the Trenches: Letters from France, June-November, 1917. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1918.
  • Stevenson, William Yorke. To the Front in a Flivver. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917.
  • Stevenson, William Yorke. From “Poilu” to “Yank”. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1918.