exchange participants

Anna, a photography major at Oklahoma State University Institute of Technology (OSUIT) had always been interested in learning about the lives of international students and their experiences in the US. When she bumped into Umaira, a Global UGRAD-Pakistan participant, on the OSUIT campus, she jumped at the opportunity to interview her.

In celebration of International Education Week, Betsy Engebretson provides an IREX Russia perspective on the value of studying abroad and the changes she has witnessed working with international students. 

One of the things I love about my job is that I get to see the world through other people’s eyes. When exchange participants arrive in the US and encounter new things on campus for the first time, I get to see how my country looks to them and hear about what Americans are like from an outside perspective. When they return home, I hear about what they notice at home now – after their time in the US – that they never noticed before.