Benefits to Membership >Affect Public Policy
- To articulate the strategic role of international education in preparing leaders
for an increasingly global society
- Proactively to define policy on significant issues affecting the
internationalization of education
- To develop effective advocacy skills of AIEA members
- To create a viable communication system that supports the effective and
timely engagement of AIEA membership in advocacy efforts
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Associations Urge Bush Administration to Promote and Strengthen International Education
By AMY RAINEY
Sample Letter
The Bush administration has heard from two groups of higher-education
associations this week on the importance of international education in
today's global economy and on ways to improve it.
In a letter sent on Tuesday to the U.S. secretaries of state and
education, several associations outlined measures to strengthen
international education. And in a statement released on Wednesday, two
additional associations urged the administration to create an
international-education policy.
Commending International Initiatives
The letter, written as a follow-up to the U.S. University Presidents
Summit on International Education, held in January, discusses components
of a national program that would help ensure that students develop the
language skills and cultural competence that are "needed for the nation to
operate effectively and securely in the global environment of the 21st
century." At the summit, the Bush administration announced a $114-million
proposal to increase the teaching of "critical" foreign languages, as well
as measures aimed at enticing more foreign students to attend American
institutions and sending more Americans to study abroad (The Chronicle,
January 20).
The letter commends President Bush's National Security Language Initiative
and American Competitiveness Initiative, and discusses the compatibility
of the language initiative with the Lincoln Study Abroad Fellowship
Program and with Title VI of the Higher Education Act, which supports
foreign-language and area-studies programs.
The letter also urges the administration to lift some of the restrictions
placed on international scholars, and expresses concern about policies
that would require researchers to obtain export-control licenses to use
equipment that is designated as "sensitive." The letter was sent by the American Council on Education, the American
Association of Community Colleges, the American Association of State
Colleges and Universities, the Association of American Universities, the
National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, and the
National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges.
Call for a National Policy
In the statement calling for a national policy on international education,
two groups -- Nafsa: Association of International Educators, and the
Alliance for International Educational and Cultural Exchange -- stressed
the importance of international education as a means of remaining
competitive in a global society.
The policy should promote international studies, foreign-language study,
and area studies, the statement said, as well as more international
content in American education.
The groups recommended the development of strategies to restore America's
status as a magnet for international students and scholars, and to
establish study abroad as an integral component of undergraduate
education. And they urged the administration to remove "unnecessary
barriers to international scholars," including visa restrictions.
The statement calls on President Bush to publicly announce a policy and
propose adequate money to support it; to assign specific tasks and
deadlines to federal agencies; to appoint a senior official to be in
charge of the policy; and to create an advisory committee to guide the
policy and the steps necessary to put it in place.
The full text of the statement, "An International Education Policy for
U.S. Leadership, Competitiveness, and Security," is available on Nafsa's
Web site.
