The North American Youth Exchange Network was simply an incredible experience, and I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to attend on behalf of our District.
What is NAYEN?
The North American Youth Exchange Network, commonly known as NAYEN, is a Regional Association representing 167 districts, in Canada, Mexico and the United States, which are involved in Rotary Youth Exchange. The annual three day conference provides a forum for training youth exchange officers in best practices and the opportunity for interaction and collaboration with our overseas counterparts. NAYEN further supports its members through the development of resources and training materials to support their district programs.
The North American Youth Exchange Network facilitates collaboration and provides support to Rotary Districts and Multi-Districts in the USA, Canada, and Mexico, and promotes Rotary youth exchange around the world. I discovered that it is just one conference out of several, in different regions of the world. Needless to say, I am excited for the opportunity in the future to attend others, as well.
The conference was packed with information and offered a variety of training and break-out sessions every day. For instance, each day began with a Plenary session, which then led to training and break-out sessions before lunch; then the afternoon followed with same path - more training and breakouts and an afternoon Plenary session, before dinner and evening events. Instead of attempting to try to list out all that was offered, I've simply attached the 11 PAGES (!!!) of the Program Outline. (CLICK HERE to download the program outline.) As you can see, the Conference program was extensive . . . and I was overwhelmed with information!
I also made so many new friends from all over the world, and exchanged contact information for our District! Which was the most amazing part of it all in my opinion - the actual direct, face-to-face contact and new friendships that I made with our exchange partners from Sweden, Switzerland, several Districts from Brazil and Mexico, Belgium, France, Argentina, Paraguay, etc., etc., etc., etc. As the Outbound Chair for our District, it gave me a level of confidence and satisfaction knowing that I personally made direct contact with many of the Districts where we are sending our own Arizona students. And all of that doesn't even include all of the contacts and friendships that I made within the States, that I am now able to use for resources, questions, sharing of information, training documents and materials. All of those resources combined, are invaluable to Youth Exchange and to our District.
A couple of other things I learned on the side - Mexico and Brazilians sure know how to throw a party! After attending the Mexican party Thursday night, and the Brazilian party Friday night, it was quite difficult to "get up and at 'em" for the early morning sessions! (Needless to say, coffee was my friend Friday and Saturday mornings.) I also learned, that all of us in youth exchange have similar priorities - teaching tolerance and acceptance of cultural diversity, developing better world relations and friendships, service to others, peace building, facilitating and implementing effective training for our youth exchange program, and support of students during their three year Rotary exchange experience (the year before, the year of, and the year after). Again, so much that I took in, so much that I learned, and so much that I now can teach - I am very excited to share it all with others.
On a side note, I also discovered that we are considered the "rogue" or the "wild-card" state. (Yes, those are actually two terms that I heard us referred to as.) Ha! Yep, apparently, we prefer to have a direct say-so in the exchange process, instead of joining a multi-District group that handles that all for us. We continue to make our own contacts and choose our inbound exchange partner Districts, and we choose our country placements for our outbounds. The downside to that, of course, is that WE DO ALL OF THE WORK!!! I'm new at all of this of course and it is my first year, but so far I understand that we are very hands-on and, as such, are quite happy being the "rogue". (I'll get back to you on that in another year or so (wink).)
Again, I am new, and I have a lot to learn; but, youth exchange does hold a very special place in my heart and I'm excited to be involved.
A big THANK YOU to Polly, for asking me several years ago, if I'd consider hosting an exchange student.