The impact of the Sept. 11 attacks is said to have shaken many beliefs, broken many myths and hit almost every sector of American life one way or another, not sparing the economy, industry or education.
Despite many negative effects, there are a few sectors that have gained from the situation, and one of them is government-sponsored foreign-student exchange programs.
These programs saw an increase of 227 percent since Sept. 11, according to the Institute of International Education.
The number of students and scholars the U.S. government funds has risen to 10,111 in the previous school year, compared to 3,085 two years ago in 2002-03.
These figures stand in sharp contrast to a general downward trend in the number of foreign students and scholars, a number that has experienced a gradual decline since Sept. 11.
While U.S.-sponsored students figures increased 227 percent, overall student-exchange program enrollment continues to dip, reaching a 25-year low during the 2003-04 school year with a record drop of 4.5 percent.
The low enrollment of foreign students in the past four years is often ascribed to restrictions in visa policies and Homeland Security Department measures to counter terrorism, which instated such restrictions.
Officials said a strict visa policy for students was seen as an important check of the influx of terrorists into American territory.
But officials also said U.S.-sponsored exchange programs became a priority, serving as a means to uproot the culture of terrorism from the world by promoting American values and interests.
From their inception in the early 1960s, these programs have been valued as an effective instrument of public diplomacy.
"U.S. State Department funding for these programs was going up, due to public diplomacy in winning war against terrorism," said Peggy Blumenthal, vice president for educational services at the IIE, indicating an increase in the number of scholars and fellows under the Fulbright and Humphrey fellowship programs.
There are about 200 exchange programs from which more than 18,000 exchange students, scholars and researchers benefit every year.
Fulbright scholarships and Humphrey Fellowships are among the leading programs. The key partners of these programs are the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in the U.S. Department of State in Washington and the IIE with its head office in New York.
The exchange programs - funded mostly by U.S. government and international agencies - began in the late 1950s and early 1960s in the era of Cold War with the vision of promoting cooperation through education and research for creating better understanding between the United States and rest of the world.
According to program literature, these programs serve to create public diplomacy.
Student exchanges for public diplomacy
While the programs are more than a half-century old, they have recently added the objectives of public diplomacy and gaining cooperation through education exchange.
New dimensions and fields of research have been included to meet the emerging needs of international challenges.
Special sections of these programs are dealing with a post-Sept. 11 world view.
For example, the view that some now see Sept.11 as linked to the Muslim faith is dealt with in one exchange program.
In the Scholars of the Century program, under the umbrella of the Fulbright program, categories such as exchange of religious scholars with the objective of creating better understanding of the religions particularly Islam have been added.
Conflict resolution is another growing field for the exchange students and scholars.
In April 2002, during the hearings before House Appropriations Committee, Congressman Frank Wolf, R-Va., chairman of its subcommittee on public diplomacy, said he hoped to put additional funding into public diplomacy for the Islamic world.
On this occasion, former Ambassador and Chair of Alliance for Public Diplomacy Kenton Keith called for a $75-million Islamic exchange initiative to strengthen U.S. ties with the Islamic world in line with the Senate's "Cultural Bridges Act of 2002" authorizing $95 million for Islamic exchanges.
In the Fulbright program this year, a journalist from Iraq has participated for the first time and is carrying out media projects at American University at Washington.
Similarly, in the Humphrey Fellowship program, four people from Afghanistan are participating after 20 years.
"For the first time, people from Afghanistan have been selected," said Shukria Kazmi from Afghanistan. "[Though a] man from Afghanistan who was selected for Humphrey Program could not get a visa."
Kazmi said that while issues of public diplomacy with the Muslim world are gaining momentum, at the same time Muslim students are the ones who face the difficulties in acquiring visas.
University exchange students
The number of scholars and fellows under various programs has increased in many countries.
For instance, in Pakistan there used to be two to three people selected for the Humphrey program. But this year, there are nine fellows from Pakistan placed at different universities in the United States.
"There has been definitely an increase in the numbers of Fulbright students as well as scholars who have come from Pakistan this year," said Shaheena Masud a Fulbright student from Pakistan pursuing a Master's degree in education at the University.
But she also pointed out that few of the people who were selected besides her were facing some difficulties in acquiring a visa by the time she had left for the United States.
For some countries, the number of scholars didn't vary much.
There are two fellows from Turkey for 2004-05, which usually gets two or three, said Aysegul Cerci of development Bank of Turkey, currently a Humphrey Fellow at the University.
She also said she did not have any difficulty getting her green card.
"I didn't face any difficulty. Rather, my visa process was facilitated as I was coming on a J1 visa," she said.
Pavel Ullman - another University Humphrey fellow from the Czech Republic in the field of architecture - said the figure for Humphrey fellows from his country has not changed.
"It was pretty much the same for this year as the previous years," he said.
Fulbright and Humphrey as federal programs
The exchange programs have remained successful in promoting public diplomacy in different ways, students said.
Sen. William J. Fulbright founded the Fulbright scholarships program in 1964.
Under this program, outstanding scholars and students from 146 countries pursue academic degrees and research in the institutions of higher learning in United States and vice versa.
Similarly, the Hubert H. Humphrey program was founded by the former vice president. It draws in outstanding mid-career professionals from the developing countries to the United States.
These fellows - besides taking course work at the universities - contribute toward American society through professional work in their respective areas of expertise.
The significant role of a U.S. education in exchange programs in promoting American interest through public diplomacy is well recognized and defended at various forums.
In 2002, Harvard University economist George Borja published a report that questioned the credibility of education cooperation in promoting the interests of the United States.
In response to the report, IIE President Allan Goodman pointed out that U.S. leadership, in support of international education, remains central to making the world less dangerous place.
"A world in which our country doesn't protect the exchange of people and ideas across the borders is just the kind where ignorance, hatred and intolerance [that] would flourish, and that is just what the terrorists want to create," he said.
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