The International Students Association is trying to stick to its motto, “Promoting Diversity.”
The 10-year-old club is advised by Bakersfield College counselor Shohreh Rahman and has 94 members from 27 different countries, intended to give support to foreign students attending BC and allow other students to learn more about different cultures, according to the club’s president, Ahmed Wani.
“The most important thing we need to focus on is diversity,” Wani said. “We want to help the international students when they come here because they have so many problems with immigration and finding apartments, to make them more orientated with the Bakersfield system.”
Wani said the club is seeing more American student members because it is interested in learning about other cultures.
While the club is gaining more recognition, according to club vice president David Saliba, there are still many things the organization would like to accomplish, like getting a place on campus to hold meetings and having other counselors than just Rahman to help international students. He said he feels the club does not obtain enough support from the administration and has experienced several failed communication attempts with BC President Dr. Sandra Serrano.
“We don’t have very good support, unfortunately, from the president of the college and what we need to do is organize a good program to help other students who come after us because right now we’re building our club. We started from basically nothing and grew to nearly 100 members,” Saliba said.
Serrano said she does not recall any communication attempt from the program within the last year, and that the administration does support them, but the college doesn’t have the resources the program is requesting. She said BC has other counselors who have worked with international students previously, and that campus space is not provided for clubs, only the Associated Students of Bakersfield College.
“Certaintly the college embraces the opportunity to add cultural diversity and enrich our learning environment … I think everyone needs more resources. It has nothing to do with the value of the requests, it truly has to do with the amount of revenue we have to spread so thinly,” Serrano said.
Despite this, club treasurer Jenny Cachaya said joining the club is a great way to learn about other cultures and people on campus.
“Knowing people from other countries makes you more open to other cultures and customs and languages,” she said. “It’s really interesting to know what they eat and how they spend holidays, their lives.”
Wani said the club is seeing more American students joining.
“I would think Americans would be interested in learning more about international cultures, and really don’t want to go to the TV and turn on CNN,” he said.
The club holds fund-raisers, including car washes and selling candy grams, with all of the profits going to scholarships for international students. To find out more information about the club and how to join it, go to its Web site at www2.bakersfieldcollege.org/ISA.