Harvard (finally) gets a passport

This is exactly what Harvard is hoping. Indeed, its other curriculum reviews in the 1940s and '70s served as catalysts for both debate and change in the US academic world.

Harvard hopes to provoke a debate with its new curriculum changes, says Jorge Dominguez, director of the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Every year at commencement in Harvard Yard, he says, the graduating seniors are "welcomed into a fellowship of educated men and women." Now is the time, he adds, for everyone to reevaluate the meaning of "educated."

"It's a very important debate to have," notes Abundio Maldonado, Guatemala's former ambassador to the US and a Harvard grad.

When he first got to Harvard in 1949 and told people he was from Guatemala, he recalls, the response he most often received was: "Is that in Texas?"

"I am afraid," says Mr. Maldonado, "... that the situation has only gotten worse since ... many young Americans do not have a clue about the rest of the world."

In fact, with or without Harvard's awakening, it seems US undergraduates, their parents, and their colleges have been realizing the need to "get a clue" for some time now, and the situation is finally, slowly getting better. The number of US students receiving credit for study abroad has been going up since the early 1990s - and jumped by 8.5 percent in the academic year 2002-03, reaching a record total of 174,629, according to IIE.

This increase coincides, ironically, with a post-9/11 decrease in foreign students coming to the US for study, Ms. Blumenthal notes. In the 2003-04 academic year, the US was experiencing its first absolute decline in foreign enrollments since 1971-72 - down 2.4 percent to a total of 572,509.

The decrease has to do in large part with changes in US policy that make it tougher to get a student visa, she explains, as well as concerns among foreign students that they might not be welcome in the US.

In starting its overseas undergraduate program with a study center in Chile, Harvard is also challenging a different tradition: US universities have always had stronger links with Asia and Europe than with next-door Latin America.

According to IIE, the country with the most foreign students in US colleges is India, with nearly 80,000 students, followed by China, South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan.

By comparison, even though the numbers have been increasing over the past 10 years, Mexico has only 13,300 students on US campuses. Colombia and Brazil have about 7,500 students each, Venezuela 5,500, Peru 3,700, Argentina 3,600, Ecuador 2,345, and Chile 1,612.

Meanwhile, IIE reports, 63 percent of American college students go to Europe for study abroad, while only 15 percent choose Latin America. "Kids think going right across the border is not exotic enough," explains Blumenthal.

But there is nowhere better to begin an exploration of the world than next door, insists financier David Rockefeller, who funded the Harvard Center for Latin American Studies.

"It's clear to me that America needs friends," says Mr. Rockefeller. "One good way to start making them is to get to know them. And there is no better place to start than with the neighbors."

Though he never made it abroad during college, Mr. Reyes did eventually fulfill his dream of traveling overseas, coming to Mexico three years ago to teach video and filmmaking at a local college. He rented a house in the hip Condesa neighborhood, learned Spanish, and decided to stay for a while.

Last week, he donned a nametag, put on a coat and tie, and came to the Harvard alumni event to hear Summers speak about globalization and the importance of international experience.

"I am really glad to hear Harvard admitting they were wrong," he says. "And it's OK. No one is perfect."

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