Over the past six years, a transformative wave of learning has been taking place in secondary school classrooms around the world, driven by educators dedicated to fostering global citizenship education (GCE). That legacy reached a major milestone this past Saturday as AFS Intercultural Programs hosted a virtual ceremony event to celebrate the conclusion of the 2025–2026 AFS Effect+ for the Classroom program.
The AFS Effect+ for the Classroom program is a full scholarship program for teachers who want to learn about global citizenship education, and how to foster it with their students. Supported by the Cyril Taylor Charitable Foundation, this fully funded virtual initiative has grown into an extensive global network. To date, the program has empowered more than 1,650 teachers across 73 countries, ultimately impacting an estimated 247,500 students globally over the past six years. The latest cycle alone saw 300 educators from 51 countries successfully equipped with new frameworks to shape the next generation of changemakers.
Ashutosh Srivastava, Spanish Educator from New Delhi, India (2025-26 Program Participant) reflected on their experience:
“This program influenced my teaching by helping me move beyond simply teaching content and towards creating opportunities for students to think about global issues and different perspectives. As a language educator, I realized that language learning can be much more than vocabulary and grammar—it can be a bridge to intercultural understanding, empathy, and responsible global citizenship.” — Ashutosh Srivastava
The Educator’s Journey: From Competence to Classroom Action
The 2025–2026 learning journey, which kicked off in November 2025, was structured into three distinct phases. Teachers began by building their own global competence through the Global Up Educator course, earning their AFS Global Competence Certificate.
From there, teachers brought these frameworks into their classrooms using the AFS Educator Toolkit. The curriculum intentionally guided students through an internal-to-external progression: first exploring their own identities and how they shape worldviews, then pivoting outward to cultivate empathy, build bridges across differences, and analyze local issues through the lens of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The final phase challenged teachers to mentor their students as they designed real-world social impact projects for the 2026 Sir Cyril Taylor Young Leaders Awards.
Honoring Local Solutions to Global Issues
The virtual celebration brought together over 100 attendees, featuring remarks from William Gertz representing the Cyril Taylor Charitable Foundation, AFS President and CEO Daniel Obst, and various AFS Qualified Facilitators.
The event culminated in the announcement of the 2026 Sir Cyril Taylor Young Leaders Awards, which saw 57 student-led projects submitted from 14 countries.
Taking home the overall winning title—and a scholarship to the AFS Global You Changemaker program—was the SEED project from MAN Kota Surabaya in Surabaya, Indonesia, mentored by teacher Aldianto. The judges praised the project’s innovative use of an interactive, story-based game to educate communities on water pollution and ecosystem conservation, illustrating how small daily habits directly affect biodiversity and aquatic life.
Three standout projects also received Honorable Mentions:
- Banana ROOTS (National University Clark, Pampanga, Philippines)
- Floodshield Sandema (Sandema Senior High School, Sandema, Ghana)
- 404: Bus Not Found (IFRS Campus Bento Gonçalves, Bento Gonçalves, Brazil)
While the ceremony highlighted specific winners, AFS celebrates the entire global network of educators who remain committed to embedding global citizenship into their regular curriculums. Every community benefits when their youth think critically about these issues and work together to devise solutions.
AFS extends its deepest gratitude to every teacher, student, and partner who made this journey possible, and remains steadfastly dedicated to empowering the voices that will build bridges across differences everywhere.