During Phil Geier’s site visit to Earlham, he was presented wih an album depicting the scholars’ many activities by sophomore Julia Daniels of the United States. Earlham is one of the many schools benefitting from having a significant cluster of students on campus

At 1,200-student Earlham College in Indiana, where the population of international students has surged from three percent in 1997 to 12 percent this year,  American senior Anna Crumley-Effinger has seen the difference a globalized community can make. 

"Today I was in an economics course, and there were quite a few international students there," says Anna, who grew up in Richmond, Earlham's home town. "It was just the first day of class, but we were having a very dynamic discussion about the changes that international trade makes. Some students were really speaking with passion, because they've seen major changes from international trade in their own countries. That just jumped out at me."  

With 46 Davis UWC Scholars among its 123 international students from 50 nations, Earlham is in the midst of what President Doug Bennett calls "a full-court press on internationalization." It won national acclaim for that last year, when the college received one of the 2006 Senator Paul Simon Awards from NAFSA, the Association of International Educators, for internationalizing its campus.  

For Earlham, this globalizing push is rooted in its history, and its stimulating impacts on the whole campus are cited by students, administrators, and faculty. The Quaker college has a century-old legacy of internationalism. Today, more than 70 percent of its students, and 60 percent of faculty, have joined in study-abroad programs; 95 percent of graduating seniors have taken language courses; and nearly half of the college's majors are international in focus.  

"We think you simply can't do the most effective liberal education without having an environment here on campus that mirrors the growing international pluralism that characterizes the world," explains Provost Nelson Bingham. "International experience must be broad - and not simply a matter of sending our students on off-campus programs to other countries, but also of enriching the campus environment here." 

Earlham has begun to express the community-wide impacts that Shelby Davis, founder of the Davis UWC Scholars Program, and CEO Philip Geier are hoping to see on more and U.S. campuses, as sizable clusters of Davis UWC Scholars and other international students take form. 

"What's really happening on these campuses that changes their culture, as I see it from visiting schools and talking with students, faculty members, presidents, and staff members, is that students are learning to communicate across cultures," Dr. Geier observes. "When you visit these campuses, the nature of these conversations, and the openness and excitement of them, are almost visceral."

The Keys to a Thriving Environment
The Davis Program has aided Earlham's international admissions work by giving staff a focus for their recruitment efforts abroad, says Musa Khalidi, international admissions director. What both draws and keeps world students here, he adds, is the college's Quaker-based focus on openness and mutual support. 

"When young people ask, 'What is it about Earlham that is number one?' I tell them, 'community,'" he says. Because all faculty keep a genuine open-door policy, students can have any number of advisors, formal and informal. "That sends a message to families that their kids are in the right environment," Khalidi says. 

"We have a number of lectures, festivals, and performances where students are not only sharing and teaching about their cultures, but are learning to work collaboratively - the Latin Americans with the Arabs with the Asians, which can be quite challenging!" notes Kelley Lawson-Khalidi, international student advisor.  

"I think that's one reason the Davis students thrive here," she adds. "From what I've learned, Earlham is so much like a UWC campus:  we have these festivals; we have community service as part of who we area; we have peace and conflict resolution as part of our mission. The Davis UWC Scholars bring a wonderful energy and enthusiasm for these types of things - and they push us to do even more." 

As an international student here, "you are not just an alien," says junior Davis UWC Scholar Jawad Joya (Afghanistan, UWC of the Adriatic). "You have the ability to change people's views about the place that you come from, the places where you have been, and the kinds of places we can build together in the future. Diversity can evolve into a means for unity," he reflects. 

"Over the course of our time here, we do make friends from all over the place," concludes local student Anna Crumley-Effinger. "It really grows our community. In a sense, it makes us a world community."

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