By Oyshik Rahman Bhuyain (YES 2018-2019, Bangladesh, placed by AFS in Minnesota, MN)

The way the YES program designed this one-year high school experience for students from many different nations is flawless, and every exchange student who has been lucky enough to hop on this journey knows the long-term value of this experience. My exchange year felt like a dream. The biting cold of Minnesota turned into sweet warmth as I blended right in with my host mom and host siblings. They were always curious to learn about my culture and embraced me with complete acceptance of my differences. By the end of my exchange year, I became a more culturally knowledgeable individual. I also understood the importance of community service and how a single step towards the welfare of a community can have a positive effect.

After cultural exchange, one’s mind often starts to function on a broader spectrum, and many begin to view society through a different lens. Many people around the world are subject to misinformation and disinformation regarding the beliefs of others, leading to conflict or arguments that defend one’s own beliefs while attacking the beliefs of others. I witnessed this happening around me in Bangladesh – from my more progressive peer groups to my very traditional family members. The conclusion I drew is that few people have the privilege to learn about other cultures and religions. Therefore, I applied for a YES Alumni Grant to give youth basic knowledge about other faiths so they can reshape societal perceptions of interfaith understanding and tolerance.

Our YES Alumni Grant project, Faith and Humanism, was held in August 2022. Our team recruited 30 youth participants and five teachers from five different schools. Our first project site visit was to a Muslim mosque and a Hindu temple. The following day participants visited a Christian church and a Buddhist pagoda. After the site visits, we held a closing ceremony at which groups of participants put on performances about what they learned. Special guests, including religious leaders, principals from each school, and two U.S. Embassy officials, gave speeches. The event was a true demonstration of people from different faiths coming together in harmony.

As an active alumnus, I can say that the outcomes of Faith and Humanism stand out from other projects I’ve participated in. Participants challenged themselves to understand the beliefs of other religions in the context of their own, and then share this with an audience. We feel the project has the potential to be held annually with a larger number of students and other age groups.

"Teamwork makes the dream work." This quote became real to me while organizing Faith and Humanism. The wisdom, support, and cooperation from the school officials and hard work of our project team made the project successful. Every volunteer and student involved in the project showed tremendous kindness and exemplified the meaning of “humanism.” As the organizer, I also learned a lot and gained more first-hand knowledge about different faiths from the religious clerics who met with us.

I would like to thank the YES Program as it has been a most wonderful journey, from my days as an exchange student to now as an alumnus. I greatly appreciate our local YES office. They have been always very supportive and helped our project become a success. My “thank yous” would not be complete without giving credit to my fellow alumni as their hard work and spirit of volunteerism made it all possible. And a huge thanks to all the religious institutions and schools that collaborated with us. It has been a wonderful journey working with every person associated with the project.

Bangladesh still has a long road to being fully developed and a lot of work remains for people to achieve understanding and tolerance of other religions. However, with time and projects like these, our country is progressing.