Universities often talk about providing support to international students, particularly because many of us have flown halfway across the world to a foreign place where nothing feels familiar. This year, against the backdrop of a global pandemic, this feeling is even more intense. For other international students however, this couldn’t be further from their experience. International students on any college campus have varying family backgrounds, cultural ties and life experiences. We need to reframe the narrative that international students belong to one homogenous group.
Like many international students, I grew up more attuned to American culture than to that of my own country. I watched Arthur on Saturday mornings, ate Froot Loops for breakfast and spoke English at home. In fact, I learned my mother language, Nepali, thanks to my mom’s diligent efforts as I went to preschool in South Burlington, Vermont. On the other hand, I know plenty of international students whose parents don’t speak fluent English, have never travelled outside their home country and have only ever watched movies in their native tongue. Both exist, and so do many other complex identities along this spectrum.
During my first week at Smith, I had a conversation with a domestic student who believed she “could definitely relate” to feeling overwhelmed from traveling so far away from home for the first time. But I didn’t relate to this at all. Having attended boarding school since the age of nine, being away from home wasn’t an unfamiliar experience for me, and because of my father’s international development job, I had moved schools six times before I hit double digits. Another time, someone asked me if I knew what Customs & Border Protection was. I replied politely, saying that I did, but the interaction left me feeling misunderstood. It feels like as soon as I say I am an international student, people construct a very static idea of who I am and what my life looks like. Often, domestic students and staff seem to assume that international students have no experience in the US, or outside their home countries in general. While this comes from a place of concern, it can make us feel like children who need their hand held through this “new world,” regardless of how familiar we are with it already.
It’s little moments like these that have opened my eyes to how people perceive international students. In a country where people who look, act or speak differently already have a whole world of biases to navigate, Smith should be a comforting space where these assumptions about who we are do not exist— or at least, do not matter. It’s not necessary to start every conversation with a remark about how hard it is to be away from home. We should get to know international students and their experiences just as we would any other person, with openness, kindness and no preconceived notions about who they are.
Of course all incoming college students are adjusting to a completely new environment, and it is undoubtedly newer for some of us than others. We cannot dismiss the fact that for many international students, being at Smith is a huge difference from anything they’ve ever known. But the diverse identities of the international student community at Smith should not go unnoticed. We should aim, both as an institution and individually, to be more nuanced in our understanding of those around us, especially those whose backgrounds are so starkly different to our own. That, to me, is how we can best support international students.
(Photo by Smith College)
