Bucks offers a gateway to various opportunities in education, career goals, and determining your future for all kinds of students, even those who live overseas.
Bucks is among the group of colleges with a program that recruits international students to study on campus in order to achieve their individual academic goals.
While Bucks has accepted students who were attending campus with visas for over twenty years, it didn’t start actively recruiting students until October, 2007.
This program was headed and managed by Vice-President Jason M. Mayland, Director of Admissions Marlene Barlow, and Recruiter Casey Grunmeier. Mayland stated “It is my sincere hope that all of us can embrace and benefit from international students in an increasing globalized society.”
The main goal of this exchange program is to create a more diverse student body. It also benefits them with an education while having them share their experiences with other Bucks students.
The countries that these students are selected from include, but are not limited to, Yemen, Nigeria, Nepal, Russia, Zimbabwe, Thailand, India, Ukraine, Albania, and China.
Giorgia Serica, 22, a Civil Engineering major from Albania, said, “The benefit of having more international students at Bucks is great because I can experience a variety of cultures that I wouldn’t be able to experience back home.”
In order for the students to attend Bucks, they must first go through a process in their home country to get themselves set up and obtain visas and enter the U.S.
First, the college searches for promising individuals and issues an academic I-20. Once this is done, the students must set up an appointment with the U.S. embassy in their country and are interviewed for about 1-3 minutes.
The students must also provide the embassy with their documentation, bank statement, and passport in addition to applying to Bucks in advance. The embassy decides whether the application gets approved or denied, and must inform Bucks if they were approved.
After that, they must then go through student process which includes taking the placement test, course selection, and paying tuition. In addition to their visas, international students must register as full-time students.
Once the students have completed their studies at Bucks, they return to their homes.
Collins Horinda, 20, a Mathematics Major and Shola Swarres, 20, a Sports Management major, both from Zimbabwe, are among these students who were accepted to Bucks.
They both said, “We met Mr. Mayland and Mrs. Barlow though our educational agency in Zimbabwe. After hearing about the benefits of studying at Bucks, as well as the small class size and location, we knew this would be the right fit for us. Everyone here is so welcoming and helpful. It makes being so far away from our family a little easier.”
Bucks is committed to giving its students the best possible experience when it comes to their academic studies.
Recruiter Casey Grunmeier stated “Having these students experience the American culture can not only be beneficial to them, but to us as well.”