It was overwhelming to see some of the students who did not talk at all during the pre-departure orientation back in June 2018, were now not ready to stop sharing their experiences in front of the whole group-indeed a great transformation. This is how the re-entry orientation of 13 AFS Year program students began with enthused young ambassadors returning from France, Czech Republic, Finland, Italy, Norway, USA, Germany, and Denmark.
The orientation, held in Delhi from 12th to 14th July 2019 focused on reflecting on the exchange year, the reverse cultural adaptation cycle, planning how students can take these new developed global skills forward and their future engagement with AFS as alumni. The orientation was facilitated by AFS India Staff Members.
These students not only successfully completed their exchange year of 2018-19, but they have also now emerged as a sensitized global citizen. Most of them, now even more aware about the Indian culture and equipped with learnings from a new diversified culture of their host country. Learning a language such as Finnish, Dutch, French, German, etc has been yet another feather in the cap for these returnees for life.
AFS Returnees were also given an idea about chapter engagements. They were made aware of the AFS India’s processes and various activities that they can participate in once they go back to their chapters. Each of the staff members of AFS India connected with the returnee via an online call to introduce the processes and gave them clarity on the expectations once they go back to chapter as alumni.
The 3 days of experience sharing, reflections and talks culminated into a fun lunch of celebration before they took off on their new journey of being AFS Alumni. We wish the newly AFS graduates good luck. We look forward to seeing them get engaged and participate in various activities as an alumnus and volunteers. Our heartfelt gratitude to all the stakeholders for their tremendous support to the students.