A Take on Education, Migration, and Immigration...What Connects America to the World and Why |
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It is National Poetry Month in the U.S. and while many of us are still awed by the eloquence of Amanda Gorman’s The Hill We Climb, an anthem for hope and renewal, I’m reminded of another poet—Rabindranath Tagore—whose verses were actually adapted into India’s national anthem. Tagore gained global visibility for becoming the first Indian to be awarded the Nobel Prize (for literature) in 1913, but a long-forgotten fact is his association with America, which he visited five times between 1912 and 1930. Tagore wowed American audiences, particularly in California, and a 1916 issue of the New York Times described him as a “tall, stately man…” resembling “some portraits of (Walt) Whitman but with greater delicacy.” During a time when the sons of prominent Indian families were heading to England to study, a prescient Tagore sent his oldest son, Rathindranath, to study agriculture at the University of Illinois in the U.S. with the hope that he would return to solve the problem of food shortage in India. Given the almost 200,000 Indian students who have studied in the U.S. in recent years, it is hard to believe that there were just 100 Indian students in the U.S. in the early 1900s. Indians were such a rare sight in the U.S. that a telegram sent by Rathindranath and a friend to the University of Illinois informing them of their arrival by train had been incorrectly transcribed as “Two students from Indiana.” Rathindranath became active in student services for foreign students at the University of Illinois, where he founded the first Cosmopolitan Club. By 1912, twelve such clubs had opened across the country, forming an important support system for international students. These clubs were the prototype for today’s International Student Associations, which serve as a lifeline for students on U.S. campuses. I too recall the time where, as a volunteer for the association on my campus, I lost count of the number of times I woke up early to drive to the Raleigh-Durham airport to pick up a bedraggled international student who had just ended a 24-hour journey. The Tagore family’s exchange of ideas with the U.S. has continued over generations. Today, Sundaram Tagore, a descendant of Rabindranath Tagore and a highly regarded art historian, gallerist, and award-winning filmmaker, leads the Sundaram Tagore Gallery in New York and Singapore. Originally from Kolkata (Calcutta), Sundaram obtained his undergraduate and graduate degrees in the U.S. and studied for a D.Phil. at the University of Oxford. |
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Tagore Circle Reunion in 1912 and 1913 in the home of Dr. and Mrs. A. R. Seymour in W. Nevada to hear the poet Rabindranath Tagore (seated center) read and discuss his poems. (Photo courtesy: South Asian American Digital Archive, SAADA) |
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This month instead of featuring a book, I am sharing my favorite Tagore poem, one that is loved by many Indians. It is a poem with a timeless message. For me, it always brings back a clear memory of my school days where our Headmaster, Dr. Shomie Das, often began the morning assembly by invoking this moving poem. Poem 35 in Gitanjali Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high Where knowledge is free Where the world has not been broken up into fragments By narrow domestic walls Where words come out from the depth of truth Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit Where the mind is led forward by thee Into ever-widening thought and action Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. |
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My Top Picks & Highlights |
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- This month was a terrible reminder that we are still in the midst of a growing pandemic: the global toll of lives is a staggering 3 Million. Can poetry help us heal and weather these difficult times? Here's a wonderful piece by the excellent Jane Brody.
- U.S. universities are eager to welcome international students this fall, the students are eager to come, but can visas be issued fast enough? And if they can't, then what will it mean for U.S. universities? For all you data people out there: check out this amazing tool by Shorelight that maps what will happen to the U.S. higher education sector if COVID-19 related restrictions and delays continue.
- And related to this...I had the opportunity to speak alongside New York University President, Andrew Hamilton, Chancellor Judy Miner of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District, and other colleagues at an event organized by the Presidents' Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration and NAFSA about the national-level risk if international students are unable to return to the U.S. this fall.
- I love teaching and seize the opportunity when professor friends invite me to speak to their class. Some days ago I had the opportunity to interact with students in a graduate class on International Education and Public Diplomacy taught at George Washington University by Dr. Kyle Long. The students had some tough and probing questions for those in our field, including our university and government leaders: What are the intersections of public diplomacy, how the U.S. presents itself to the world, and the domestic issues of social (in)justice that we are currently facing? What motivation do universities have to be international beyond the outcome-driven incentives of revenue from international students and growing their rankings? If you would like to share your responses, email them to me at rajika@rajikabhandari.com and I will feature them in the next newsletter!
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Stunning Statistic This issue's Stunning Statistic comes from the Council on Foreign Relations which recently released the second edition of its Women's Power Index which ranks 193 UN member countries on how equal their women are when it comes to political participation. The good news: The U.S. made the most significant gains, especially following the November election, from a low rank of #128 to #43, with the number of women in the cabinet rising from just 17% to nearly half (47%) of Biden's cabinet. But it's not all good news: UN Women estimates that it will take until 2063 to reach gender balance in national parliaments globally. |
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Sharing some more praise for the book, this time by the wonderful Maeve Higgins whom you can also catch each weekend on NPR's Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me.Trust me, she's very funny. "As the U.S. veers ever closer to nationalism, there are clear voices guiding us back to what the country once aspired to: a country where the best and brightest in the world could have a shot at a better future. Rajika Bhandari is one such voice, urging us with moral clarity and rigorous intelligence to embrace immigrants in higher education. This book tells a personal story and a wider one too, it's a clarion call for the nation's policy makers and educators, to welcome into the nations ranks any and all curious minds willing to join in the pursuit of an education." --Maeve Higgins, New York Times columnist, award-winning author of Maeve in America: Essays by a Girl from Somewhere, host of hit podcast Maeve in America: Immigration IRL and StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson | | |
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