Kent State continues to grow with construction to create more room to house all of the colleges and areas of focus it offers to students. But its also expanding in diversity with international students coming to study here state-side and broaden their horizons. And Kent State has some programs that many don’t hear of that help those students feel more at home. TV2 reporter Alexandrea Rehner has more on the story.

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If you visit the Kent State library you can usually hear a soft hum of students studying, but every Monday from one to two p.m., you can find the International Conversation Hour on the fourth floor. With Emily Seibel leading the conversation or listening politely to to other members of the circle.

Emily works for the Writing Commons on the fourth floor, who hosts the program. But for Emily it isn’t all work.

SOT: “Oh I love it. I’m a HDFS major, Human Development and Family Studies major, so all I want to do is help people. And the fact that all I have to do is talk to them and listen to them. That’s great. I mean it’s an easy way to help people.”

STAND UP: The conversation hour Emily is apart of is just one program here at Kent State. With so many domestic students and a small, but growing population of international students. What other programs does Kent State offer to help international students feel comfortable state side?

So far Kent State has a total of 2,772 international students. And that number is expected to grow by 10 percent as it has just about every year.
Another office helping international students is the office of Global Education. Where International Student and Scholar Advisor Gyorgi Mihalyi-Jewell helps students ease into the Kent culture.

SOT: A lot of times international students arrive to campus. And keep together with their own–with students from their own national area. And we try to integrate them more into the community. To the whole Kent State population.

One of the programs from Gyorgi’s office to help newcomers, is the Kent State International Mentors. In which domestic students ca help international students by simply talking with them and being a friend. This is just another way Kent State is expanding its diversity. For TV2 KSU I’m Alexandrea Rehner.