Here is the Church, Here is the Steeple

[January 16th, 2008]

Last Friday night, the basement of the First Baptist Church in downtown Portland hosted an evening of fellowship for 50 people.

The church scene wasn’t all that unusual. After a brief prayer, the group enjoyed four varieties of soup and then talked about how they all could have a healthy 2008.

There was a twist, however, to the weekly get-together. The group in the First Baptist basement comprised current or former international students from Portland State University. And the host for the evening was Friends of Overseas Citizens and University Students, or FOCUS.

A coalition of area churches and campus ministries, FOCUS formed in 1986 to help PSU’s international students with big tasks like improving their English and finding places to live, as well as small items such as traveling to and from the airport. PSU couldn’t do that then.

“The university typically doesn’t have the money to provide those services,” says Ron Riesinger, a FOCUS coordinator who is also a Presbyterian missionary specializing in outreach to foreigners. “Not that many universities do.”

But some people say the alliance between the public university and faith-based FOCUS isn’t kosher, especially given PSU’s tremendous push to increase its international enrollment, the fact that students traveling here from afar make for a vulnerable population, and because PSU has its own International Student and Scholar Services department. That department helps students with visas and financial questions. And it also works with campus groups to provide activities for international students. But no group on campus provides basic services such as an airport shuttle.

“In the best of all situations, I would think those services would be done in-house,” says Samuel Henry, an associate professor of education at PSU. “But we depend on lots of our colleagues and neighbors because we don’t have the resources.”

Not all of FOCUS’s events take place in churches. And the group’s overarching emphasis, organizers say, is on friendship, not God. Yet FOCUS does have another explicit mission: to familiarize international students with the Bible.

In December, it hosted a Christmas banquet, and about a dozen PSU international students performed a play chronicling the birth of Jesus. Riesinger’s profile on the website for Sunset Presbyterian Church says he “trains local people in engaging internationals with the Gospel” and “meets regularly with students to share the love of Jesus with them.”

PSU officials know about FOCUS. About two students a year complain to the International Student and Scholar Services department because they attended a FOCUS event without knowing it was a Christian group, says Judy VanDyck, director of the PSU office for international students.

VanDyck doesn’t have a problem with FOCUS’s Christian bent, but she does periodically remind its organizers that promotional material must identify the group’s origins.

Eighteen months ago, PSU administrators created a new position on campus: international student life coordinator. The goal was to increase programming for foreign students so that volunteer groups such as FOCUS wouldn’t have to do it all. “It’s always hard to totally keep up,” VanDyck says.

Keeping up is a growing concern. In 2006, PSU’s international student enrollment was 1,626—almost 7 percent of its overall student-body population, making it the largest foreign-student population in Oregon, according to the Oregon University System. China, India, Japan, South Korea and Saudi Arabia are among PSU’s most well-represented foreign countries.

Praew Borvornprechavanich, a Christian from Bangkok who’s studying business administration at PSU, says she frequents FOCUS activities and enjoys them because they help “to spread God’s love.”

But FOCUS also welcomes non-Christians. Eid al-Qahtanni, a Muslim, is from Saudi Arabia. He says FOCUS feels like a second home.

Oko Davaasuren, a graduate student from Mongolia studying finance, is also a member of PSU’s Organization of International Students. He says FOCUS cosponsors campus activities with OIS. Yet FOCUS receives no funding from PSU and OIS does. (FOCUS does, however, keep an office on campus, which it gets for free.)

“They really do a lot of nice stuff for international students and the greater community,” Davaasuren says.

This doesn’t allay some people’s concerns. International students pay higher tuition than Oregon students. And PSU’s Intensive English Language Program costs nearly $3,000 a semester, meaning foreign students are a source of revenue that could be used to fund services FOCUS provides to justify its existence.

“In many ways, they definitely pay a lot more but get less,” says Rudy Soto, president of PSU’s student body.

News intern Shefali Kulkarni contributed to this report.