The Youth Leadership Programs consist of four programs: the Youth Ambassadors, Benjamin Franklin Summer Institute, Youth Leadership, and American Youth Leadership Programs.

For more information about the individual programs, contact the administrating organization for your home country listed below or YLP@state.gov. Please include your name, country of origin and reason for interest in the program in your message.

Youth Ambassadors Program

The Youth Ambassadors Program brings together high school students and adult mentors from 25 countries across the Americas to promote mutual understanding, increase leadership skills, and prepare youth to make a difference in their communities. Exchanges are primarily from Latin America and the Caribbean to the United States, but also include delegations from the United States to select countries. Participating countries/regions include:

• Paraguay, Uruguay
• Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, and Peru
• Caribbean: Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago
• Central America: Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama
• Colombia, Ecuador, Haiti
• Venezuela
• Tri-lateral North American Program: United States, Canada, and Mexico

Benjamin Franklin Summer Institutes

The Benjamin Franklin Summer Institutes are intensive academic institutes hosted by a U.S. college or university. These programs are more academic in nature than other Youth Leadership Programs, and focus on global issues, in addition to leadership and community service. American youth participate in these institutes, but do not travel abroad. There are two Benjamin Franklin Summer Institutes:

• Benjamin Franklin Summer Institute with South and Central Asia: Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and the United States
• Benjamin Franklin Transatlantic Fellows Summer Institute: Europe and the United States

Youth Leadership Programs

Youth Leadership Programs began in 1999 with the Bosnia and Herzegovina Youth Leadership and Teacher Professional Development Program. These programs now include both one and two-way exchanges. One-way exchanges bring foreign youth to the United States, but do not send an American delegation abroad. A two-way exchange sends a delegation to the United States and a delegation from the United States to another country/other countries.

Two-Way Exchanges

• Youth Leadership Program with Azerbaijan
• Indonesia-U.S. Youth Leadership Program
• U.S.-Poland Parliamentary Youth Leadership Program
• Youth Leadership Program with Central Europe: Hungary, Serbia, Slovakia, and Slovenia
• Youth Leadership Program with South Asia: Nepal, Sri Lanka and Maldives

One-Way Exchanges

• Algeria Youth Leadership Program
• Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program
• Youth Leadership Program with Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Youth Leadership Program with the Philippines
• Youth Leadership Program with Southeast Asia: Brunei, Burma, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam
• Youth Leadership Program with Sub-Saharan Africa (Bold Leaders): Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and South Africa
• Youth Leadership Program wtih Sub-Saharan Africa (States 4-H International Exchange Program): Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and South Africa
• Youth Leadership Program with Sub-Saharan Africa: Burkina Faso, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Mali, Mauritania,and Niger

American Youth Leadership Program

The American Youth Leadership Program is for participants from the United States to travel abroad to gain firsthand knowledge of foreign cultures and to collaborate on solving global issues. This is the second year of the American Youth Leadership Program, and the destination countries include:

• Bangladesh: Climate Change
• Cambodia: Media and Cultural Literacy
• Cambodia: Environment and Climate Change
• Costa Rica and Panama: Environment and Sustainable Agriculture
• Japan: Environmental Conservation
• Kenya: Food Security and Nutrition
• Kenya: Technology Literacy and the Digital Divide
• Mongolia: Environment and Climate Change
• Norway: Climate Change