Withdrawal Rates for Students Rise Across U.S.

A rising number of the 40,000 Arab college students studying abroad in the U.S. are withdrawing from their respective institutions in the wake of Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Sixty-three students in total have withdrawn from all of the California State University campuses. Forty-five students have withdrawn from the University of Missouri. Forty-one students have withdrawn from the University of Colorado at Denver; 32 have withdrawn from American University in Washington, D.C.; and 12 from the University of Toledo.

Numbers about withdrawals at Harvard were unavailable this weekend, although the New York Times reported yesterday that a bin Laden relative had just withdrawn from the University.

These reported withdrawals are only a small fraction of the total number of Arab students nation-wide who are leaving school, according to a report last week from the New York Times.

In Washington, D. C., American University spokesperson Todd Sedmak said that various sponsors of government study-abroad scholarships in Arab nations have offered scholarship recipients the option of returning home for the semester. Tuition reimbursement and airfare paid by students’ countries are available for those wishing to return home, Sedmak said.

Kuwaiti Embassy spokesperson Noida Ashton also noted these options and added that of the 3,000 Kuwaiti students studying in the US, less than 200 have opted to return home.

Of these 200, “All have made proper arrangements of withdrawal and plan to return for the spring term,” Ashton said.

Harvard Islamic Society spokesperson Tawfiq I. Ali ’03 said that many Arab students are concerned about safety issues.

“It seems very clear that there’s a great deal of anger over what happened. [People] are going to start looking for scapegoats, and those scapegoats are going to be people of color or of a specific minority religious faith,” Ali said.

Ali added that “although some people have been concerned about the events last week at BU and there is some feeling that there’s a need for caution, the University has been very good to us, made sure to keep an eye on our events and on security for our events.”

A Saudi Arabian, Boston University student was stabbed after leaving a fundraising event in Boston earlier this month.

The Harvard registrar would not confirm this weekend any withdrawals from Arab students at the College.

And spokespeople from California State University, the University of Missouri, the University of Colorado at Denver and the University of Toledo all denied a connection between students’ withdrawals with their respective institutions.

“The increase of academic withdrawals among Arab students at the University of Toledo is not a result of students safety concerns,” spokesperson Tobin Klinger said. “In essence, what [many Arab students] have been saying publicly is that they’re not feeling any pressure here to leave, whether that pressure is pressure from their peers, or [pressure] as seen in the media.”

Klinger calls students’ decisions to return home a “personal matter” between students and their families.

He said the students he has counseled are being urged by parents in the Middle East to return home.

“Their parents have been influenced by the media, and they’re obviously seeing media different from the media in the U.S.” Klinger said.

Sedmak also said that American University students’ are deciding for themselves—independent of the university’s atmosphere—about whether to leave the U.S.

“The student response has nothing to do with the university climate. Tomorrow, for instance, we’re holding a large Muslim prayer service that’s expected to attract about 500 people,” Sedmak said.

At the University of Missouri, spokesperson Christian Basi said that on a list of reasons for withdrawal given to school officials by students, safety concerns expressed by students themselves rank of least importance.

Instead, Basi said students have cited family pressures, as well as some students’ inability to concentrate on studies while dealing with the emotional aftermath of the attacks, as their reasons for departing.

School officials from California State University, the University of Missouri, American University and the University of Toledo all said that the increased numbers of students on leaves of absence is temporary.

According to Basi, all of the students who left the University of Missouri havesaid they plan to return to the campus in January. American University spokesperson Sedmak said the students on leave have all completed coursework from past terms, and that they are prepared to return in the spring.