Student Success Initiatives for International Undergraduate Engineering Students

With the recent trends of increasing international student enrollments in colleges of engineering within the United States, a new emphasis has been placed on the transition, retention, and graduation of this population. Student success programs and policies aimed at increasing or improving retention and graduation rates of engineering programs can typically be categorized into three areas: curricular, extra-curricular, and faculty/staff. Within each of these categories, programs can be found that target the success of international undergraduate engineering students. This paper will review the recent trends of international student enrollments and graduation, highlight challenges facing this population, and provide promising practices in each of the areas of curriculum, extra-curricular opportunities, and faculty/staff support and development.