Global Link Decoded

Global Link has a number of terms that are not necessarily intuitive. This page will contain a list with explanations.

IOC - For country abbreviatations (country codes) AFS uses the standard abbreviations defined by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

For a list of country codes, see Partner_country

This column gives a Placement code (letter or letters) followed by three numbers in parens that correspond to (F,O,T).

The placement codes are

"G" - Guaranteed

"F" - Finalist(no longer used in GL, legacy code for the transfer of data from OPUS):

"FF" - Priority Finalist (some issues - i.e. missing forms, multiple allergies/med conditions, questionable content)

"WL" - Wait Listed (if other Stus withdraw or rejected, these stus will be considered)

"RJ" - Rejected

The numbers that follow represent:

"F" is Family. If the student is currently on his or her second host family, it's a "2".

"O" is Organization. That will be the school for most exchanges. It could also mean a community based organization for community service programs.

"T" is Travel. A "one indicates that a travel plan has been assigned to the participant.

Program Code - the program code is an eight character code that gives information about a participant's exchange.

The first two digits give the length of the exchange.

"YP" is a year program.

"SM" is a semester program.

"VS" is a "Very Short" program (2-4 weeks).

The second two digits give the type of program.

"sc" stands for "school", it might also be called a core student.

"ys" is a YES student.

The third two digits give the arrival cycle.

"NH" is for students arriving in August.

"SH" is for students arriving in January.

For more information about NH and SH see Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere.

The fourth two digits are a two-digit year of arrival.

Example: "YPcbNH09" is the program code for a participant who came on a Year Program as a Congress Bundestag student in August of 2009.