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The Regents of the University of California
 

International education: Does it matter?

BY JOHN A. MARCUM

California is internationally dependent. International trade accounts for about 20% of its $1.4-trillion economy. And, like the economy at large, trade trends have not been good. Exports from California fell from approximately $120 billion in 2000 to $85 billion in 2003. At the same time, tourism, plagued by nationally imposed security and visa restrictions, fell from more than 6 million visitors in 2000 to just over 4 million in 2002.

Under pressure to cut costs, the Legislature closed down the state’s vehicle for promoting California abroad, the Technology, Trade and Commerce Agency. Its 12 offices included an office in Mexico, California’s biggest customer, with $16 billion worth of exports in 2002. In the short term, by plunging into the picture with filmed commercials and trips abroad to pitch and polish California’s image and boost tourism, exports and foreign investment, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger may be able to stop and even reverse California’s international decline.

But California’s economy will depend upon the human resourcefulness of an internationally oriented and educated populace. This will require a strengthened educational system, from K-12 on up, that will develop the technical and cultural skills needed to meet the demands of contemporary technology and productivity for in-state job retention. Given that much of California exports — computers, electronics, telecommunications, bio and medical technology, pharmaceuticals, and myriad entertainment and other services — are high in intellectual content and face cutting-edge competition in Asia and Europe, the state needs the instruction and research of a vibrant, globally connected and enlightened university.

The international qualities of the University of California, however, face serious challenge. Research and instruction, creative intellects and imaginations are essential to a flourishing economy. But the hurdles and humiliations of post-Sept. 11 visa procedures and the precipitous rise in graduate fees may seriously reduce the presence at UC campuses of first-class minds and enterprising spirits from abroad. There are already signs of a nationwide decline in the ability to attract overseas students and scholars despite the prestige of American higher education.

UC also needs to produce cadres of young Californians who can function effectively in the global marketplace. It needs to produce fresh leadership that is informed and sensitized by academic study and experience abroad. Responding to this international imperative, UC’s Education Abroad Program (EAP) expanded fourfold over the past decade to reach an enrollment of more than 4,000 students in 2003-04. A casualty of state budget cuts, however, EAP’s enrollment has been capped at a time when coping in a world of unprecedented opportunities and dangers requires that a much larger proportion of young Californians be exposed to the realities of the world on which their lives will depend.

The world will not stand still and wait for California to get its act together. UC must overcome the dangers of isolation and reduced international contacts. It must educate about and for a volatile, high-velocity world or be left behind.

Marcum is UC associate provost of International Academic Activities and universitywide director of Education Abroad Program.