As we head into the holiday season, AFS-USA would like to share a friendly reminder about policies surrounding Independent Travel, Sending Parent/Guardian Visits, International Travel and Belo Tours.

Given the uncertainties surrounding the Omicron variant and the evolving landscape of the US governments’ COVID-19 response and travel regulations, AFS-USA’s policies remain as follows:

1. Independent travel (travel without the host family and/or an AFS-USA Volunteer) is not currently permitted for USA hosted participants on the NH21/SH22 cycle.
2. Similarly, visits from family members and friends are not currently permitted.
3. International travel with the host family is also not currently permitted, as AFS-USA cannot guarantee that the hosted participant would be permitted to re-enter the US.
4. AFS-USA will not offer Belo Tours for the 2021-22 school year. Belo Tours are optional independent travel tourism trips so are considered independent travel.    These trips are facilitated by Belo Tours, a travel tour agency with whom AFS-USA has partnered for many years and incur an additional cost to participant/parent. This also means that students may not participate in a Belo Trip offered by another exchange organization.
5. School trips organized by a participant’s host school are considered part of the school program and are permitted so long as trip-related forms/waivers that require sending parent signatures are obtained (these can be obtained directly from the participant’s parents by the participant and/or host family). Note: As in previous years, an AFS-USA travel waiver is not required for school trips.

If you receive a related question from a host family, please refer them to this article available in their Global Family Tool platform.