Colleges and universities across the United States “are taking measures to attract a more geographically diverse group of international students,” reports The Chronicle of Higher Education reports. These measures address concerns that U.S. colleges and universities are potentially becoming too reliant on certain international regions, limiting the diversity on campuses and creating unnecessary risks.

According to the article, some colleges and universities have started to offer financial aid and scholarships to attract more students from smaller, underrepresented countries, such as South Asia, Latin America and elsewhere. These colleges and universities have realized that “international diversity enriches campus culture, helps undergraduates in the U.S. prepare for the globalized workplaces of tomorrow, and is a hedge against the risk of a sharp, sudden drop-off in the foreign enrollment.”

If a college recruits the same kind of student, “whether it’s from students all from the same geographic location or its students all from the same social station, there’s a weakness there,” says an academic official from Pomona College. “It’s not really preparing students to deal with the real complexity of the real world.”

Source:U.S. Colleges Seek Greater Diversity in Foreign-Student Enrollment