IEFA Blog

Each year, US News and World Report ranks thousands of US colleges and universities based on a number of factors, school input and research. Although many critics continue to attack rankings in general and the US News approach in particular, there is no doubt that it is the most influential of all college rankings. (See…

Each year, the Institute of International Education publishes the Open Doors Report, packed full of information about international students in the US, US students abroad and trends in international education. One of the tables I check out each year is the Primary Source of Funds table. This shows the primary source of education funding for…

As we did last year, we would like to provide a quick update as we start 2010 for international students looking to finance an education in the US. We begin 2010 in a much more settled position that we did 2009, with loans available, but still with constraints to education financing as a fallout from…

International Students in the USA The number of international students studying at colleges and universities in the USA (2008/2009 schoolyear) increased by 8% to 671,616, and the number of US students abroad (2007/2008 school year) increased by 8.5% to 262,416. Both the inbound and outbound totals, released by the Institute of International Education (IIE) in…

InternationalStudent.com is excited to announce the launch of the fourth annual InternationalStudent.com Travel Video Contest! Prizes are bigger than ever – the Grand Prize is $3,500 and there will be other great prizes, like an iPod Touch and a video camera. Not to mention worldwide fame and fortune in the international education community with your…

Over the past few years, there have been two main types of private loans, including those private loans available to international students. The first are called “school certified” (or school channel, in lender terms) and the second are called “direct to consumer” loans (DTC in lender terms). Direct to Consumer Loans With direct to consumer…

As the fall semester approaches, and the level of inquiries that we receive about international student loans peaks, its a good time to review the state of play in the market for international student loans. Much has changed in the past year. The credit crunch and economic crisis continues to impact the availability of international…