WASHINGTON (AP) -- From Japan to the United Arab Emirates, foreign students are seeking out American campuses to advance their education. Eager to take them in are U.S. colleges and universities.
"We literally recruit around the world," said L. Jay Oliva, the president of New York University, which had the most foreign students of any U.S. school, according to a study released Sunday.The number of foreign students attending colleges and universities in the United States increased 5.1 percent in the 1997-98 school year to a total of 481,280, said the Institute of International Education in its report.
The study found the number of American students studying abroad increased even more, by 11.4 percent, to nearly 100,000.
Despite America's reputation for having some of the world's best schools, U.S. campuses have been losing foreign students to other countries in recent years.
The U.S. share of students studying abroad has dropped from 40 percent to 30 percent over the past 15 years, according to the study, largely because schools in countries such as Great Britain, Canada, Australia, France and Germany often charge half the $20,000-plus tuition costs of America's top private schools. As in the United States, schools in these countries also recruit heavily.
Nevertheless, the incentive to come to the United States remains strong, said Natasha Malhotra, 20, from the United Arab Emirates.
"U.S. degrees are the most marketable," said Malhotra, now a senior at New York University. "To get a job where I'm from, you need a degree from either the United States or the United Kingdom. I like the living conditions here a lot better."
Among schools with significant foreign student enrollment, NYU's was the largest with 4,964 students, followed by Boston University and Columbia University.
New York City led among the nation's cities with 29,855 foreign students. California was the leader among states, followed by New York, Texas, Massachusetts and Florida.