We all know that liaison linking is one of the three essential components of a compliant placement, along with a host family and school placement. However, for years the process for identifying and confirming compliant liaisons for placements has been challenging and, at times, unclear.

Each year we receive feedback from those who work closely together on the liaison linking process, including Support Coordinators, Associate Support Coordinators, Support Staff, and Team Development staff, about the challenges of liaison linking. And, while the process has slightly improved over the past several years, there has still been a good deal of dissatisfaction with the process.

This year, with the cross-organizational collaboration and input of Support, Team Development, Hosting, IT, Organizational Development, and Volunteer representatives from the Compliance and Support Advisory Groups, AFS-USA has seized the opportunity to create a new, more user-friendly system that teams can use to manage their liaisons. This new interface replaces the manual google doc that had been used with an automatically updated widget on MyAFS. This widget will provide up-to-the-minute information to teams and includes the ability for volunteers responsible for linking liaisons to make those links directly.

This is an exciting, new addition to MyAFS, so please join us during one of two upcoming webinars to learn more about this tool, which we expect to launch on April 30.

Tuesday, April 30th at 3 pm EDT – Register here: https://afsusa.zoom.us/webinar/register/4920acfd09f6dec034538d7d4481ef37

Thursday, May 16th at 8 pm EDT – Register here: https://afsusa.zoom.us/webinar/register/359febf8ae9c75897c24e00bf0acd2b8

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinars.