Funding Education Abroad

As education abroad professionals learn about the various regulations for federal and state financial aid, the number of scholarships and grants potentially available to study abroad students, and how funding for education abroad works on their own campuses, the next logical step is consideration of new ways or model initiatives for funding.

One unique model is the approach taken by the University of Texas at Austin, where all students enrolling at UT Austin pay a mandatory fee of $4 per semester or summer session to fund a financial assistance program for eligible students participating in international study or student exchange.

Student Fee Scholarship – Case Study: Texas’ International Education Fee

Students from the University of Texas at Austin rallied together in 1987 to create support on campus for a $1 student fee to support scholarships for students participating in international student exchange or study programs. In 1989, the Texas Legislature authorized the scholarship to apply to all state institutions of higher education who pass local referendums. Ten years later (1999) students at The University of North Texas rallied together to convince the Texas Legislature to raise the fee from $1 to $4 per student per semester. UT Austin was then able to raise the local fee to $3 per student. Other campuses across the state have been successful in raising the fee to the maximum of $4 per student.

To our colleagues around the nation we offer this advice:

• anything is possible, and it only takes a few (driven) students to make it happen
• this initiative did not consume our offices’ staff
• this is proof positive that grassroots projects can be accomplished
• each year UT Austin awards over $300,000 in scholarships to students participating in international student exchange or study programs. This is cash in hand that domestic students can use to pay program deposits, or buy their passport or plane ticket.
• informational packets about this scholarship can be obtained from Heather Thompson in the Study Abroad Office at UT Austin
  

A number of model initiatives for internationalizing the campus are feature by the American Council on Education (ACE). Many of these initiatives use a combination of funding sources to underwrite the initiatives, and reading through some of the strategies can give you ideas that might work on your own campus.