Carol Blythe discusses the EducationUSA advising conference program in New Delhi with Janaka Pushpanathan (Chennai) and Sudarshan Saha (Kolkata), advisers at the US-India Educational Foundation (Fulbright Commission).

The College Board, along with approximately 15 U.S. institutions, joined EducationUSA advisers from 33 advising centers at the triennial regional conference for South Central Asia Jan. 12-15 in New Delhi, India. The meeting, which focused on enhancing skills needed for counseling students about U.S. academic programs, is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State as a professional development opportunity for affiliated overseas educational advisers at Fulbright commissions, U.S. embassies and consulates, nongovernmental organizations and American Corners. Student mobility trends show ever-growing interest among students of Central Asia, as well as in India and her neighbors. India continues to lead all other countries as the source of international student populations on U.S. campuses, according to Open Doors data for 2007-08. Anecdotal evidence points to the value of a U.S. education as justification for South Asian families’ investment in U.S. college degrees, despite the economic downturn.

Clay Hensley and Sheri Fischer (American Embassy School) joined Janine Farhat on the career counseling panel at the EDGE conference in New Delhi.

Education reform, technology and funding innovations were key topics at the second annual Emerging Directions in Global Education (EDGE) conference held in New Delhi a month later, as Indian higher education leaders and secondary school heads strategized with corporate and government partners. They discussed expanding the capacity of their own institutions, as well as
attracting U.S. students to programs in India. The College Board designed a workshop titled “Academic Counseling for Career Planning” in an effort to promote more diverse choices for Indian students entering university programs. Many Indian families set their sights on medical, law or business careers for their children, as “guaranteed” paths to economic success regardless of student interest or talents. Indian employers seeking to compete globally are becoming more interested in broadly based academic preparation and creativity vs. the traditional system of the past. Counselor Sheri Fischer of the American Embassy School in New Delhi led a lively discussion at the workshop about family involvement in student choices and techniques for identifying student aptitudes.

Over the last two months, various international school regional associations have held conferences around the world. These annual events draw together educators from international and American-style schools within the regions of East Asia, South America, the Near East and South Asia to explore critical education topics ranging from articulating curriculum and differentiating instruction to becoming a green campus.  
The College Board partnered with these associations to deliver Advanced Placement® (AP®) and Pre-AP® professional development for teachers at these conferences. The AP and Pre-AP workshops are sponsored by the U.S. State Department’s Office of Overseas Schools, whose mission is to assist schools that serve expatriate U.S. citizens around the world and promote U.S.-style education. These schools also serve and educate a large number of students from the host country and international students seeking a U.S.-style education who may continue their higher education studies in the United States.

This spring, the College Board delivered a total of eight AP and Pre-AP workshops at Colegio Nueva Granada in Bogota, Colombia, in conjunction with the Association of American Schools in South America Conference; in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, at the East Asia Regional Council of Overseas Schools Teachers’ Conference, and at Cairo American College in Egypt as part of the Near East South Asia Educators’ Conference.

The workshops also delivered subject-specific topic sessions during the main conference programs. One such session delivered at the East Asia Regional Council Teachers’ Conference was titled “A United Korea: At What Cost?” and  suggested that a student might use the reunification of Germany as a model to begin evaluating the economic costs involved in
reuniting the two Koreas. The workshops and sessions offered the opportunity for AP and
Pre-AP teachers across international borders to share ideas, best practices and establish a network of colleagues.     

Educators interested in teaching and working opportunities at international, American-style schools around the world can learn more at the following Web sites, among others:


U.S. Department of State,

Office of Overseas Schools

Council of International Schools

International Schools Services

Guatemala City was the site for the College Board’s 13th Latin American Conference, known as Congreso Latinoamericano, which was held in March. Partnering with the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala (University of the Valley of Guatemala), the College Board’s Puerto Rico Latin America Office hosted nearly 250 educators from Guatemala, Puerto Rico, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Bolivia
and Ecuador.

“We were very happy with the number of participants this year,” said Janning Estrada, executive director in the College Board’s PRLAO. “Current economic conditions have affected attendance at conferences everywhere, and we were afraid travel expenses would be difficult for many people, but attendance declined only slightly from previous years.”

Guatemala’s minister of education, Ana Ordóñez de Molina, addressed the group at the opening ceremony, and her vice ministers, Manuel Salazar and María Ester Ortega, each served on one of two panels assembled by the host university to address the major themes of this year’s conference — “Cultural Diversity in Education” and “Cultural Diversity and Evaluation.” Diversity is an urgent issue in Guatemala, where 24 native languages are spoken by the many indigenous groups. Many classes must be taught bilingually, which causes problems with textbooks, creating curriculum and test preparation.

The conference began in 1992 as the biannual Congreso Técnico, becoming an annual event with its current name in 1999. Like the College Board’s regional forums in the U.S., the nonprofit conferences bring member educators from throughout Latin America together for three or four days to make connections with colleagues and explore issues of common concern. The conference provides an opportunity for the PRLAO to promote and market College Board programs and offer technical information to constituents, all with the support of our test development and research staff.

Although the conferences are coordinated by the PRLAO, the successful execution of the conference depends on much support from the host institution — electronic equipment, personnel, transportation, etc. — and the institution’s financial support allows registration fees to be kept low for participants. This year’s host, College Board member Universidad del Valle de Guatemala (University of the Valley of Guatemala), offered tremendous support — even inviting all participants to its campus for a cocktail dinner, shuttling them on a panoramic tour of Guatemala City and transporting them to lunch on the final day in beautiful Antigua, a city an hour west of Guatemala City that was founded by Spanish conquistadors in 1543.

The Universidad del Valle de Guatemala is a very prestigious private, not-for-profit, secular university led by Rector (President) Roberto Moreno Godoy. Founded in 1966 by a private foundation that had previously overseen the American School of Guatemala, the university was the first private university in the country to give a strong emphasis to technology and technical background. The current enrollment is about 3,000 students.

Because the host institution is critical to the success of the conference, there is great anticipation toward the end of every conference as to which institution will be the host of the next year’s conference. There is a ceremony in which the next host is announced.

For the 14th Latin American Conference in 2010, the host institution will be the Morelia, Mexico, campus of Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education). A very prestigious university in Mexico and College Board member, with 33 campuses in 25 cities, Tecnológico de Monterrey is known for having one of the top graduate business schools in the region.

The Tivoli Student Union and the Community College of Denver hosted the recent Toolkit workshop for two year college recruiters seeking to internationalize their campuses.

The seventh annual “Community College Toolkit for International Student Recruitment” workshop, co-sponsored by the College Board and the American Association of Community Colleges, was held in Denver, Colo., Feb. 24-25, immediately following the Western Regional Forum.  The event drew 27 administrators from two-year colleges in 14 states across the U.S. to participate in two days of intense discussions to develop strategies and services for increasing international student enrollments. Most view this as an integral
part of internationalizing their campuses and educating their local students for global competence. Many more programs are being developed abroad for U.S. students, although these are usually shorter-term than those typically sponsored by four-year institutions and frequently involve faculty-led or service-learning programs. 

A highlight of the workshop was critiquing college Web sites from the perspective of a foreign audience, along with tips on social networking tools for outreach to prospective students — examples of “armchair” recruitment techniques that don’t require expensive overseas travel.