Of course, I had to convince my parents to allow me to do this huge adventure to a different country without them. My dad was easy to convince because he is always for me experiencing new things, but my mom needed some persuasion. I just needed to mention what I could gain from the experience and how it could benefit who I am as a person. (more independent, better at languages, it would teach me to carry through with ideas till the end) She also ended up being not too hard to convince.
The application process was long and a little complicated. This is the the list of things on the side of the website that I needed to complete. They started off as orange boxes, turned to checkmarks, and eventually the locks that are seen here.
Cover
This was basically a picture of myself that would be used as an International Student ID Card.
Personal
This page was some information about your contact information and the contact information of your family.
Placement
This was an electronic form that would help determine host families that would be right for you. Some info included whether you have religious needs, allergies to animals, smoking, etc.
Health Certificates
For this, I had to go to the doctor's office and give them a form to fill out and I scanned it and uploaded it to my application page.
Self Intro
This was a page long letter that was addressed to your host family telling them about yourself.
Photo
This one was pretty fun. I basically had to upload some pictures of me doing things I like to do with friends and family.
Parent Statement
This was an agreement from my parents that I had their consent to be applying. They also answered some questions in essay form about how I am as a person.
Academic Record
I had to get a copy of my transcript from my vice principal and it had information about my school habits for the last 3 years. The GPA requirement is only 2.0 so it wasn't super challenging.
Participation Agreement
This was like the parent statement except for myself.
Consent
This was basically a form that stated that everyone in our family was on the same page.
Letter Of Recommendation
We had to get someone, preferably a teacher, to write a letter of recommendation about how we are in class and what kind of person we are. I had my freshman Spanish teacher write it for me.
After I sent the completed application, it took a couple weeks, but I heard that AFS USA had accepted my application. The next step was to send it over to AFS Spain which then accepted the application a few more weeks after that. This acceptance confirmed that they would guarantee to find me a host family and I was now fully admitted into the program which was obviously very exciting.
PS I am now 50% to my fundraising goal!
