Minority Students Feel Safe Abroad

Minority students take into consideration different factors compared to their white counterparts when deciding whether to study abroad, according to a recent study by professors from the Augustana College and the University of Iowa.

These findings suggest that colleges that hope to boost minority enrollment in study abroad programs should consider these unique cultural influences when recruiting underrepresented students.

Data collected by the Office of International Programs shows that student participation in Harvard’s semester, full-year, and summer study abroad programs increased by 284 percent over the past eight years. Although a racial breakdown is not available for Harvard’s study abroad program, national data shows that minority students participate at significantly lower rates than white students.

Although this inequity may pose a dilemma for other colleges, Robin Mount, the director of Career, Research, and International Opportunities at the Office of Career Services, said she believes that this not a problem at Harvard.

“I actually don’t think it’s an issue on our campus,” she said. “I think we have to be very careful not to stereotype students of color the same way.”

Although Mount has never encountered a student who has declined to study abroad in a specific country due to fears of racism, she said she has dealt with students whose religious beliefs influence their decision of where to study, although parents raise these considerations more often than their children.

Most of the time, however, the decision of where to study abroad is based on academic and career interests.

“Our program here is super customized,” said Mount. “We don’t have a ‘one size fits all’ program. We piece together programs depending on a student’s concentration and interests.”

Ge “Gracie” Jin ’11, who is Chinese, chose her study abroad destination to experience a culture she had never encountered before. She said she did not want to study abroad in China because she had already been there, and so spent a semester in Cuba and a summer in Peru to improve her Spanish proficiency.

Jin said that the local Cubans called her “Chinita” which means “little Chinese girl,” but according to Jin, “it wasn’t racism; it was a term of endearment.”

Mount said that cultural, linguistic, and academic interests are the determining factors for Harvard students.

“For our students, it’s really about what they’re studying and wanting to go deeper into their area of study,” said Mount.

One example is that of Chika A. Okoro ’11, who is African American, and based her study abroad destination on her academic interests. She spent a semester studying at the University of Havana in Cuba in order to be around students “who could readily quote [Karl] Marx,” whom she had studied extensively as a Social Studies concentrator.

She was also “very interested” in racial relations in Cuba.

Although Okoro said that racism was definitely present in Cuba, she “never saw that as a deterrent” to studying in the country.