Posted on 09/08/2006 8:25:15 PM PDT by Phsstpok
They are coming to study at US educational institutions, which welcome foreign students and the chance to exchange views and ideas with people from different cultures and backgrounds. I doubt that the spreading of "Wahabi teachings or interests" would find a very receptive audience on American college campuses. I say that advisedly having lived in Saudi Arabia for five years.
I thought you might find this LGF post interesting:
Saudis Sending 15,000 Students to US to "Stem Unrest"
The Saudi government has approved its largest scholarship program in history.
They’re planning to send 15,000 young students, indoctrinated to despise infidels by the Wahhabi educational system, to the United States: Huge Hike in Number of Scholarships. (Hat tip: Sabra.)
KING Abdullah, who is also the chairman of the Higher Education Council, has approved a program to allocate 15,000 scholarships for study in the US and 3,000 in some Asian countries.
Announcing this here Monday, Minister of Higher Education Dr Khalid Al-Anqari said this is the largest scholarship program by the government so far.
The program will include doctorate, master’s, fellowship and bachelor degrees, according to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) report.
US college administrators are overjoyed at this windfall: U.S. Schools Compete for Saudi Students.
MANHATTAN, Kan. — Thousands of students from Saudi Arabia are enrolling on college campuses across the United States this semester under a new educational exchange program brokered by President Bush and Saudi King Abdullah.
The program will quintuple the number of Saudi students and scholars here by the academic year’s end. And big, public universities from Florida to the Kansas plains are in a fierce competition for their tuition dollars.
The kingdom’s royal family — which is paying full scholarships for most of the 15,000 students — says the program will help stem unrest at home by schooling the country’s brightest in the American tradition. The U.S. State Department sees the exchange as a way to build ties with future Saudi leaders and young scholars at a time of unsteady relations with the Muslim world.
Administrators at Kansas State University, an agricultural school surrounded by miles of prairie grass, say the scholarships are a bonanza for public education. “The Saudi scholarship program has definitely heightened our interest in that part of the world,” said Kenneth Holland, associate provost for international programs. “Not only are the students fully funded, but they’re also paying out-of-state tuition.”
Kansas State has boosted efforts to court Saudi officials in the last year, flying administrators and department heads to the Saudi embassy in Washington. It’s paid off: last month about 150 Saudi students started classes there, each funded to the tune of about $31,000.
Saudi Embassy spokesman Nail Al-Jubeir said 90 percent of the 10,229 Saudi students the U.S. State Department has registered for the fall semester will also get such scholarships.
By January, U.S. government officials say the program will expand to 15,000 students, which means Saudi Arabia will send more foreign students to the U.S. than Mexico or Turkey. As funding for the scholarship program expands, those numbers are likely to grow.
“This is a critically important bilateral relationship,” said Tom Farrell, a deputy assistant secretary for academic programs at the State Department. “It’s an opportunity to increase understanding of Saudi Arabia for the United States and of the United States for Saudi Arabia.”
College administrators say common misperceptions about the oil-rich nation make it crucial to create a tolerant environment for Arab and Muslim students, who have been singled out for scrutiny since the Sept. 11 attacks five years ago.
So, as Kansas State students enjoy a string of home football games this month, they also are preparing for the campus’ first celebration of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month.
“We really want to make this special. We’re going to truck in halal food from Kansas City,” Holland said. “The Saudi government is trying to place the students in a variety of institutions across the country, but where you get the competitive advantage is how you treat the students when they get here.”
09:02 AM PDT | link: 203 comments | link only
This could be interpreted in several ways... <g>
Cross posting to last weeks Sunday Talk Show thread
Until then lots of cold showers and rollerblading.....
ROFL!
Posted at 1:12pm on Sep. 9, 2006
The Sunday Morning Talk Shows - Preview
MTP, FNS, FTN, TW, and LE
By Mark Kilmer
For Sunday, September 10, 2006
Meet the Press (NBC): Host Tim Russert talks to Vice President Dick Cheney: "the 5th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the war in Iraq, and the midterm elections." They had better also discuss the problems with Patrick Fitzgerald and his bogus investigation.FOX News Sunday (FNS): Host Chris Wallace talks to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and Dr. Howard Dean, MD.
Face the Nation (CBS): Host Bob Schieffer chats with Rice, New York Governor George Pataki, and Senator Chuckie Schumer.
This Week (ABC): Host George Stephanopoulos discusses matters with former 9-11 Commissioners Tom Kean, Richard Ben-Veniste, Jamie Gorelick, and John Lehman. We'll be reminded of all that was wrong about that political commission.
Late Edition (CNN): Host Wolf Blitzer interviews Dr. Rice and John Kerry, the junior U.S. Senator from Massachusetts.
~~~~~It is politics in memory of 9-11, with Howard Dean, Chuckie Schumer, Ben-Venista and Gorelick, and John Kerry, but then again, Schieffer is doing a New York-themed show, and the only alternative aside Chuckie is Senator Clinton. I can understand why Steph would want do disinterr the 9-11 Commission, but I don't get Wallace and Dean.
We'll be told what we should think about 9-11. I wonder if Kerry will shed a tear when he speaks of the "Bushie provocation."
Anyway, (Phsstpok) has his entertaining preview thread up at FreeRepublic.
I'll have the show-by-show review here at RedState.com tomorrow afternoon.
Posted in Special Features — Comments (0)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Dean: ABC Should Reveal Funders of Slanderous 9/11 Propaganda
This may play in tomorrows shows.
You have mail.
And what might those be? If this is a very, very bad idea, it may become clear in a spectacular way.
That's why I added
This could be interpreted in several ways... <g>
I did not fail to notice :)
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