[wvns] Strictures in U.S. Prompt Arabs to Study Elsewhere
Strictures in U.S. Prompt Arabs to Study Elsewhere
Fri Dec 21, 2007
Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2007/12/19/AR2007121902501.html?wpisrc=newsletter
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- For Nabil Al Yousuf, a senior aide to
the ruler of the Persian Gulf state of Dubai, the indignities of
arriving inthe United States since 2001 have become routine, but
remain galling. A U.S. airport immigration official typically takes
Yousuf's passport,places it in a yellow envelope and beckons. Yousuf
tells his oldest sonand other family members not to worry. And
Yousuf -- who goes by "Your Excellency" at home -- disappears inside
a shabby back room. He waitsalongside the likes of "a man who had
forged his visa and a woman whohad drugs in her tummy," he recounted.
He is questioned, fingerprintedand photographed. So when it came time
this year for the oldest son to choose auniversity, there was one
choice that seemed right to Yousuf, a fondalumnus of universities in
Arizona and Georgia. Australia. "Australia's more welcoming," said
Yousuf, the director general of theDubai government's executive
office and the executive director of theDubai School of Government.
He spoke in his glass-walled corner officehigh over the thrusting
metallic skyline of the port city of Dubai, oneof seven emirates that
form the United Arab Emirates. "When I was there, the U.S. used to be
a welcoming place. We never feltwe were foreigners," Yousuf said,
cupping prayer beads in one hand anddisplaying his University of
Arizona mug, discolored with age, in theother. In the United
States, "you just don't feel part of society anymore." The Yousuf
family is not alone. A generation of Arab men who onceattended
college in the United States, and returned home to becomeleaders in
the Middle East, increasingly is sending the next generation to
schools elsewhere. This year, Australia overtook the United States
asthe top choice of citizens of the United Arab Emirates heading
abroadfor college, according to government figures here. Ten percent
fewer students in the Emirates elected to go to the United States in
2006 than in 2005, according to the New York-based Institute of
International Education. In neighboring Oman, the drop was 25
percent. Jordan, Kuwait and Lebanonrecorded single-digit falls,
continuing a trend begun amid thecrackdowns on visas and security
that followed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The drop isn't across the
board. Iran sent more students to both Australia and the United
States. So did some Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, which is
dispatching thousands more students abroad under a massive
scholarship program. In Australia, meanwhile, the number of Arab and
Iranian students has climbed from 2,580 in 2002 to 7,122 in 2006,
according to Australia'sEducation Department. For Australia, the
numbers are the product of campaigns aggressivelyseeking the post-
9/11 Arab and Muslim market, from tourism to highereducation. The
campaigns appeal to Arabs who once might have picked Disneyland
vacations for their families and U.S. universities for
theirteenagers, but worry now about affronts at U.S. airports and
visaproblems interrupting educations. Australia offers something
different, Yousuf said: a smile at immigration counters. Theme parks
and universities in Australia have installed prayer rooms,and
restaurants offer food certified as halal, prepared in accord
withIslamic dietary law. Tourism from Middle Eastern and North
African countries rose by 20percent this year, Australia's tourism
board said. "The opportunity to have a photo with a koala is very,
very powerful forthe Middle Eastern market," Shelley Winkel, a
spokeswoman for theDreamworld theme park on Australia's Gold Coast,
said by telephone. Australian trade offices court Arab students with
semiannual collegefairs. Australian tourism boards routinely include
a section for theMuslim holidaymaker in their guides. Schools hand
new students from theMuslim world booklets pointing out local
mosques. Yousuf's 18-year-old son, Mohammed, chose the University of
Queensland,chiefly because a couple of his friends also had selected
it. But henoticed that university officials went out of their way to
make Muslims feel comfortable -- serving halal food at a luncheon for
prospective students and pointing out the halal barbecue chicken
chain off campus. "I felt it was nice and I'd adapt there very
quickly," Mohammed said last week while home on semester break. UAE
citizens still bristle over an incident in the United States last
year.
Returning with his family to California to finish his doctoral
degree, the son of the country's foreign minister was detained for 26
hours at Los Angeles International Airport, then expelled with his
visa canceled, according to news reports and Emirate officials. The
incident was front-page news in the Persian Gulf region. For days,
newspapers chronicled the doctoral student's outrage, that of his
wife, and that of his professors in the United States. "That had a
major impact," said Yasar Jarrar, executive dean of the Dubai School
of Government. This year, the school offered a student a full
scholarship to Harvard University to pursue a master's degree at the
Kennedy School of Government. The student turned it down, citing
fears of visa hassles, Jarrar said. The United States counts higher
education as one of its top five service exports. More than 500,000
foreign students studied at U.S. universities last year, pouring
$14.5 billion into the U.S. economy, according to the Institute of
International Education. Overall, the number of foreign students
studying in the United States is inching back up after a decline
following the 2001 attacks, led by surging numbers from India and
China. Less concrete than financial losses caused by Gulf students
who have gone elsewhere, but potentially more important, is the
fraying of a bond between the United States and the Arab world, Gulf
officials said. "Our generation, all of us went to school in the
States," Nabil Yousuf said. King Abdullah II of Jordan and Prince
Turki al-Faisal of SaudiArabia are among current leading figures in
the Arab world who wereeducated in the United States. Both went to
American prep schools and Georgetown University. The United States
and Saudi Arabia "understand each other very well, and for that we
can give credit to those half-million Saudis who have lived in the
United States," said Jamal Khashoggi, editor of Saudi Arabia's Al-
Watan newspaper, a former spokesman for Faisal and a graduate of
Indiana State University. The tradition of Saudis studying in the
United States "integrated the relationship we have with America, so
that despite 9/11, despite problems with foreign policy, with the
Middle East, with Iraq, with Israel, we continue to have a close
relationship with the United States," he said. For the United States,
the priority has been preventing new attacks. Muslim travelers, some
on student visas, [allegedly] carried out the Sept. 11 hijackings
after entering the United States with little screening. In June,
Australia's government-funded Australian Strategic Policy Institute
issued a report cautioning about the surge of foreign
students. "Australian universities may be attractive targets for
talent-spotting by extremist individuals or groups," the report said.
Some Australian university officials rejected the report. "Our
strategy is we are on a mission to find the future leaders around the
world," said Timothy Zak, executive director of Carnegie Mellon
University's Heinz School of Public Policy and Management in
Adelaide, an affiliate of the U.S.-based school.
"Regardless of where we find them. . . that's where we find them, and
we recruit them."
When the institute opened 18 months ago, it had a prayer room. Still,
Mohammed Al Yousuf said, the United States offers one lure
thatAustralia can't quite match: road trips.
"To be honest, after I went to the U.S. in June, I felt that life
wasbetter and nicer there, maybe," Mohammed said. "I just like the
idea of having a car and going from state to state, these kinds of
things. I'm thinking of doing my master's there."
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