Global engagement

UCA pacts bring world to its halls

Congolese, Ivorians stroll campus

UCA Upward Bound Project student Emily White (left) and Argentine high school student Matias Moar crab-walk with a ball between them during a relay race on the University of Central Arkansas campus Wednesday in Conway.
UCA Upward Bound Project student Emily White (left) and Argentine high school student Matias Moar crab-walk with a ball between them during a relay race on the University of Central Arkansas campus Wednesday in Conway.

Josue Mpia left his hometown of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to study at a university in Bangalore, India, and then at another in Shanghai before he ended up in Conway, where he said he finally felt like he could see a future for himself.

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Argentine high school students Lautaro Yanes (left) reaches for a wet sponge from teammate Lautaro Minuzzi during a relay race on the University of Central Arkansas campus Wednesday in Conway.

Mpia, 24, arrived at the University of Central Arkansas a year ago through a scholarship program the school has set up for Congolese students.

He has no complaints in transitioning from three cities of several million people to the 63,816-person town north of Little Rock. He wishes only that more Congolese students could also study in Conway.

"I can say I have a family here," Mpia said.

Mpia and 14 other Congolese students are enrolled at UCA. They represent just one partnership the school has with countries across the world, and the school is one of a handful of universities in Arkansas and dozens across the country to have such partnerships.

Global engagement among university students is a fast-growing part of higher education.

According to the Institute of International Education, the United States hosted 886,052 foreign students during the 2013-2014 school year and 289,408 U.S. students studied abroad. Both totals were at an all-time high.

That school year, 72 percent more international students studied in the United States than in 2000. The number of U.S. students abroad has more than doubled since 2000.

In addition to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the University of Central Arkansas has partnerships with schools in Ivory Coast, Argentina and Ecuador.

"This is our major way for us to create branding in other nations," said Jane Ann Williams, associate vice president and associate provost with UCA. Williams is the former director of the Division of International Engagement.

These relationships increase multiculturalism and diversity on campus, she said.

Additionally, Williams said, "The economic aspect of globalization has become integrated in universities across the world."

The University of Arkansas at Fayetteville has partnerships with universities in Iraq to accept Iraqi students in Fayetteville. The school also has agreements with universities in Panama and Vietnam.

Arkansas State University has partnerships with universities in China, Japan, South Korea, India, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Colombia, Chile and France for foreign students to study in Jonesboro. At universities where courses are taught in English, ASU students can study abroad through those partnerships, too.

The school also hosts a three-week summer camp for middle school and high school students from India, Vietnam, Japan, China and South Korea.

This year, ASU began hosting students from Mexico for a summer program that's a part of Mexico's initiative "Proyecta 100,000." The goal of the initiative is to get 100,000 Mexican students studying in the United States by 2018.

Global partnerships are common, particularly at research universities, said DeDe Long, director of international studies at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. They provide educational advantages and economic insight for students and research advantages for faculty.

Many countries want to send students to the United States for a full education.

"They need more masters and Ph.D students going back to Iraq and helping rebuild their country, so they're sending them to Europe and the U.S.," Long said, referencing UA-Fayetteville's recent activity with Iraqi universities.

Williams added that countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, where Mpia got his scholarship, are "trying to build an educated workforce."

Mpia, who who hopes to attend medical school, has done more than educate himself.

He has joined a church, volunteered with the athletic programs, been active in the African Student Association and held a job in the International Engagement office.

Matias Jose Moar, a high school senior from Buenos Aires, Argentina, met Mpia last week during a two-week stint at UCA learning English and U.S. culture with several other Argentine students.

"Josue wanted to know my Snapchat name so we could be friends," Moar said, smiling. He said people have been very friendly in his short time here, including fellow international students.

Previously, Moar's experience in the United States had been limited to three trips to Disney World, where he plans go again next week, too.

But his two weeks at UCA have him seriously thinking about studying there when he graduates from high school in the coming months. The advantage for him, he said, is that the United States is a better place than Argentina for studying music.

UCA also offers in-state tuition to international students who live on campus, making the cost of attendance cheaper than at other universities in the country, interim International Engagement Division Director Ashley Pettingill said. But she wishes more scholarships were available for international students after their arrival in the U.S.

So does Eveline Dembele, a 23-year-old accounting major who transferred to UCA from the International University of the Grand Bassam in the Ivory Coast. But Dembele noted that here, unlike back home, she is eligible for scholarships based on her grade-point average.

Dembele, one of 60 Ivorians studying at UCA, is a Presidential Leadership Fellow at UCA and an African-dance instructor. She and other Ivorian students share food from their country with UCA students, too.

"I'm learning from them [U.S. students], so I think it would be great for them to learn our African culture," she said.

But persuading U.S. students to study abroad can be challenging. For example, UCA hosted nearly 600 international students in the spring semester, while only 90 UCA students studied abroad through faculty-led programs or semester exchanges.

UCA is trying to work out an arrangement to send students to school in the Ivory Coast but hasn't established one yet. Dembele said she hoped that will happen, noting that UCA students know little about the Ivory Coast. Some have asked her if she lived among lions back home; she didn't.

Emily Polk, a senior Spanish and linguistics major, was one of five UCA students this spring to spend six months at the University of Leon in Spain, through a partnership with the school.

"I just think more people should take advantage," she said.

In just a few months in Spain, Polk learned Spanish better than she had in 5 1/2 years of study in the United States.

Polk said she thought some people didn't feel a need to study abroad because they think the United States is the center of the world. But other cultures have a lot to offer, she said, and having a semester of Spanish abroad can look attractive on a resume in the United States.

Moar said he had noticed that U.S.-centric attitude during the week he'd been in Arkansas. He said he's heard people use the term "America" to refer to the United States -- which he and other Argentines find vexing because Argentina and numerous other countries are also located in the Americas.

Nonetheless, Lautaro Yanes, a 14-year-old from Buenos Aires visiting with Moar, said the diversity he's encountered at UCA is unlike what he's used to back home.

"I think it's beautiful to see people from many places," he said.

The influx of international students is intended to have an affect on all UCA students.

"By bringing international students to the state of Arkansas, we also help our community to understand that there's a big world out there and they're able to have international communications in their towns and restaurants and churches," Williams said.

Coming to the United States is challenging for many international students at first.

Mpia said he adjusted with the help of the "friendly" city of Conway, eventually developing a new approach to his everyday life.

"Just explore yourself, you know. Just see what you can do."

Metro on 07/07/2015

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