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Local AFS volunteers urge more host families as post‑COVID participation lags
Summary
Volunteers with AFS—an international student exchange program—appeared at the May 10 Independence City Council study session to describe recent hosting experiences and ask the community to recruit new host families after participation fell from pre‑pandemic levels.
Bruce Lowery, a longtime local AFS volunteer and former Independence city clerk, told the City Council on May 10 that the Kansas City area AFS program has struggled to restore host‑family participation following the COVID‑19 pandemic. "We have had a little difficulty generating interest in involvement with our AFS program since the trauma of COVID," Lowery said, and he urged residents to open their homes to exchange students for a semester or a school year.
The city presentation framed AFS as a volunteer‑run student exchange that began nationally in 1947 and in Independence in 1959. Lowery said Independence has hosted "over 437 students since…
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