International Students

No single proposal will solve any district's problems; we're looking for proposals which have helped other districts with low enrollment, both in and out of New York State. One is quite simple: it turns out that students from a variety of nations would like to spend a year or two of high school in the United States. As the New York State School Boards Association (nyssba.org) put it a a couple of years ago, FRN12 Issue Brief: F-1 Visa (pdf)

There exists a serious educational issue for small rural schools in New York State. Currently, many such schools face the prospect of closing due to declining enrollment and insufficient state aid. The resulting impact on their communities would be devastating, given the vital nature of these schools as leading employers, as well as community, cultural and emergency centers. Just as importantly, many of these schools have no viable options for educating their children should their schools close. Geography makes transportation to surrounding districts too burdensome on small children.
One exciting way to keep these essential small schools in operation is to allow international students to spend their secondary education as students at these schools. There is an abundance of international students willing to pay tuition, which avoids any cost to local or state taxpayers. The cultural advantages to New York State students are significant as well...

That was written in support of Schumer's proposed "F-1 Visa" reform bill, which would have made it easier for the students to stay longer, and I believe that bill died in committee; not sure. Even so, the system works well enough to help a great many international students attend quite a few U.S. schools. Let's start in rural South Dakota, Spring 2012: Public schools sell empty classroom seats abroad | Reuters

Superintendent Grant Vander Vorst has an improbable plan to save his little school on the prairie - by turning it into a magnet for wealthy foreign students. This year, 11 students from China, Thailand, Germany and elsewhere account for nearly 20% of high school enrollment, bringing cash and a welcome splash of diversity to an isolated patch of the Great Plains.
Grant-Deuel is not alone. Across the United States, public high schools in struggling small towns are putting their empty classroom seats up for sale.
In Sharpsville, Pennsylvania, and Lake Placid, New York, in Lavaca, Arkansas, and Millinocket, Maine, administrators are aggressively recruiting international students.
They're wooing well-off families in China, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Russia and dozens of other countries, seeking teenagers who speak decent English, have a sense of adventure - and are willing to pay as much as $30,000 for a year in an American public school.
The end goal for foreign students: Admission to a U.S. college.

As the Huffington Post put it in 2011: Public Schools Recruit Tuition-Paying International Students To Boost Revenue

It's a growing trend: Other schools are doing the same in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Ohio, Virginia and Washington, according to a student recruitment agency in San Francisco.
Next fall, Millinocket Superintendent Ken Smith hopes to have at least 60 Chinese students – each paying $13,000 in tuition and another $11,000 for room and board – at Stearns High School. Stearns at one time had close to 700 high school students, but enrollment has fallen over the years to under 200 this year.
The first-year batch is now being signed up, Smith said, with plans for more international students in the years ahead. Local students will benefit by being exposed to those from abroad, and Chinese students will gain from being immersed in the local culture, he said.
When Smith went on a recruiting trip to the cities of Shanghai, Beijing and Fuzhou last fall, students there had never heard of Maine. But they knew they wanted to come to America to enhance their chances of going to an American college or university.
"They didn't know where Maine was, but they knew where Harvard was," Smith said. "They all want to go to Harvard."

From Education Week last February, we see tiny Newcomb, NY: Education Week: Rural Leader Buoys School With Foreign Students

In its high school grades, the school has about 40 students; 18 are from other countries. That's a significant number, given that the town has only about 200 families.
"We've gotten to the point where we're turning students away," Hults says.
Over the years, Hults has learned the differences between various types of visas, and he says the type of visa the district now requires enables it to receive tuition and accept host-family living expenses.
Newcomb has earned a good reputation among international students, and it sells itself with its location in the heart of a 6-million-acre park and its strong academics, Hults says.
Hults also has established relationships with more than 10 agencies that help find foreign students who want to come to his district.
The district requires students to have a conversational level of English-speaking proficiency to ensure they can succeed. Any lesser ability would negatively affect the classroom experience for local students, Hults says.
"If it weren't benefiting our students, I wouldn't do this program," Hults explains. "It truly does benefit our students. It has opened their eyes. It has given them broad exposure to the world, and for the kids who come here, they remain a part of our community. I think they will forever."

I think it's important to emphasize that kind of thing, rather than just the federal certification requirement and the agencies to "recruit" foreign students and the opportunity for our Superintendent to travel to China or Germany or wherever. International Student Program Adds Zest to School Life | Adirondack Foundation

Each international student pays tuition, which covers the costs of academics, including English-as-a-Second-Language support. Each lives with a local family that has at least one child at Keene Central School. A small stipend from the program fee helps the host family with expenses.
The impact that this program is having on this school of 160 students, K-12, is profound. High school students speak of the value of having a different perspective in the classroom, especially classes like American History and Government. “I wish we had this program sooner,” said one senior.

Actually it might be a very good thing if M-ECS, MCS, and SVCS had such programs too, sharing costs, appealing to different though overlapping groups of international students, and so forth. Mainly, though, it seems to me that Colgate's proximity is likely to make this work out well, not only because of the option of taking a Colgate course or two as a junior or senior, but because some Colgate students studying country X or its language might benefit from interacting with kids from that country, and the benefit might be mutual. I'm imagining a grant application to pay some such students for practical and emotional support...


Or then again, maybe not. But we should be considering it.