International Students Aid Economy
By Hengel, Mark
INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS BRING DIVERsity to college campuses and prepare students for the “global marketplace,” experts and college officials say. But the students also can contribute to an institution’s coffers.
Arkansas’ population of international students rose 9.2 percent during the 2006-07 school year when compared with the previous year, according to a study by the Institute of International Education. And Arkansas’ institutions of higher learning hope to increase that total.
Allan Goodman, president of the IIE, said the organization is best known because it administers the Fulbright Program for the U.S. Department of State. However, the IIE has also been collecting data on international students studying in the United States and U.S. students studying abroad since the 1920s.
The IIE has been collecting data to understand the “phenomenon,” Goodman said. For instance, a common myth has been that most international students come to the United States on scholarships. In reality, about 60 percent of international students paid for their education through family or personal funds, according the IIE’s 2007 Open Doors report.
“They are really an economic force and positive contribution for many communities,” Goodman said. “Globally, we think more and more students are both discovering America and are discovering that the U.S. is more than two coasts and three universities.”
During the 2006-07 school year, 2,899 international students discovered colleges and universities in Arkansas, paying $33.1 million in tuition and fees and having a total economic impact of $54.9 million, according to the IIE’s report. For the nation, 582,984 international students studied at American institutions, paying $9.9 billion in tuition and fees and having a combined economic impact of about $14.5 billion.
Big Plans
Dan Howard, vice chancellor for academic affairs and research at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, oversees the university’s international student recruitment. He expects ASU’s international student population to jump from about 150 last year to between 300 and 350 this fall. His goal is to reach 1,000 international students within three years, he said.
“It will have a phenomenal impact on our campus and the state,” Howard said.
Bringing students from other countries to ASU is an effort to help prepare the university’s students for what they will encounter after graduation.
“We live in a globally competitive, highly interlinked marketplace. And we need to prepare our students for that,” he said. “We need to bring in students to do that.”
Howard also said the students who apply to attend colleges and universities in the United States normally possess the motivation to succeed.
“They are not going to come unless they are a cut above,” Howard said. “We want our students to be exposed to bright and motivated students.”
Recruiting students who want to study at American universities makes sense for the college too, Howard said. Students from out of the country pay full tuition to ASU, adding cash to the university’s budget. An undergraduate international student at the university would pay $6,117 per semester for tuition, while an international graduate student will pay $6,320 each semester; both are about double what an in-state student would pay, Howard said.
ASU is giving its faculty a 2 percent raise this year, Howard said. Of that 2 percent, half is coming from the university’s budget, and the increased tuition earned from international students is paying the other half, he said.
“It profoundly affects the budget,” Howard said.
Building the university’s international student program will be a process, Howard said. The program was “moribund” when he arrived. His first mission was to advertise the program and hire much of his team from the University of North Alabama, where he served as vice president of administration and international relations before taking the job with ASU.
Howard said he relies on relationships he has with agents and agencies that assist students in finding an American college or university to attend. Most of the agencies Howard previously worked with at UNA are now helping Howard recruit to ASU, he said.
The agencies help students navigate the paperwork that accompanies studying in a foreign country, Howard said. Howard said he has vetted the agencies that recommend students to ASU. He also continually checks on the agencies’ credibility.
When Howard and other ASU representatives visit a foreign country, they ask the U.S. consulates and embassies to identify any “bad actors” among the recruitment agencies, he said.
Howard said he pays recruiting agencies a commission of 10 percent of an international student’s tuition – but only after the university receives the tuition.
Preparation for the World
Michael Freeman is the director of the office of international students and scholars at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
A total of 949 international students enrolled at the university in 2007, according to the 2007 Open Doors report. Freeman said the majority of foreign students enrolled at the university are graduate students.
International students – especially graduate students – are looking for specific programs, Freeman said in explaining why many land in Fayetteville.
International students pay the full tuition and housing at Fayetteville, which totals about $23,000 a year, Freeman said. Some receive athletic or academic aid, but the students cannot receive federal aid. And while graduate students can expect some help from the college, with undergraduates it’s a different story.
“Most undergrads are here through their families’ funds,” Freeman said.
In total, international students comprise only about 5 percent of the university’s enrollment, Freeman said, which does not affect the university’s bottom line. International students are important for another reason, he said.
“I think their contribution is much greater in what they bring to the campus,” Freeman said.
In 2001, 961 students enrolled for the fall semester, Freeman said, but international enrollment declined after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.
“We are hoping to surpass that number this fall; hopefully, we’ll go beyond 961,” he said.
The terrorist attacks on the United States did not deter graduate students as much as undergraduates, Freeman said.
The university is very selective about agencies it works with to attract students, he said.
“Because they represent the University of Arkansas, we are cautious,” he said. “We don’t want to clean up a mess.”
Freeman said a recent resolution endorsed by the Arkansas Legislature showed that the state wants to be a leader in the recruitment of international students to Arkansas colleges and universities. The resolution – HCR 1004 – encourages “students and faculty in the state’s colleges and universities to promote international education to ensure that students and future leaders are prepared to meet the challenges of a global society.” Seventeen members of the Arkansas House of Representative co-sponsored the resolution, along with one member of the state Senate.
It’s a Necessity
Russel Bruhn is the associate dean of the Donaghey College of Engineering & Information Technology at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. He said 44 percent of the college’s graduate students are foreign and 3 percent of the undergraduate students are foreign-born.
“A lot of students from the U.S. will go get a bachelor’s degree and then they are sick of it,” Bruhn said. “They don’t want to go to the next level like foreign students.” American students are often tempted by relatively high pay, with many EIT graduates receiving job offers in the $60,000 yearly range, Bruhn said. If an EIT student pursues a higher degree and intends to teach, he or she can expect a starting salary of only about $70,000, Bruhn said.
“If our programs were full of local students, we wouldn’t recruit from overseas,” Bruhn said. “We are by far the college [at UALR] that recruits the most because of the types of students we need.”
Bruhn also said that Arkansas is attractive to international students because expenses in the Natural State fall well below the cost of living in many other areas of the country.
“You put us up against a state like Massachusetts, it’s going to be a lot less expensive to study in Arkansas,” Bruhn said.
Copyright Arkansas Business Aug 18, 2008
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