NAICU Washington Update

Bill Would Expand Study Abroad Opportunities for College Students

November 18, 2022

NAICU joined more than 50 organizations in endorsing the Senator Paul Simon Study Abroad Program, introduced this week in the House and Senate. This bipartisan legislation, co-sponsored by Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Representatives Cheri Bustos (D-IL) and John Katko (R-NY), renames and revamps a Department of State program to expand study abroad opportunities for underrepresented American college students and to nontraditional locations. 

The goals of the program are to increase the overall number of undergraduate students studying abroad to one million in 10 years; increase the number of minority students, first generation students, and other underrepresented students studying abroad for a portion of their undergraduate experience; and increase the number of students who go to nontraditional destinations, with an emphasis on economically developing countries. 

This legislation has been in the works since 2006, when Sen. Durbin first introduced it as the Abraham Lincoln Study Abroad Act. 
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