Warm welcome awaits international students

“My life dream was to never study at my local primary school, local secondary school and local university and work within my locality thinking that the world revolves around my village,” says Vivianne Dewayne. “I had to look outside the box and spread my tentacles. That is the opportunity Mount Kenya University offered me.”

At the beginning, MKU had students drawn from Kenya. Over time, it attracted international students and therein lay an opportunity: excelling in making memorable hospitality arrangements for them.

“We had a few students from outside Kenya but their numbers started to grow,” says Mr Robert Munyasia, MKU International Students Coordinator. “We realised that we needed to establish an office to take care of them even before they arrived in the country and when they have entered its borders. The ISC office was created.

“By 2014, we had about 50 international students. Now we have more than 300.” ISC handles issues of non-Kenyan students who include citizens of the East African Community states including South Sudan. Others come from Nigeria, Cameroon, Korea, Malaysia, Comoros, Somalia, Malawi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Congo Brazzaville and Zambia, among others.

Mr Munyasia says the international students are helped before they enter Kenya by being advised on whether they qualify for the programmes they wish to apply for. The office equates their certificates with those offered under the Kenyan education system. They are informed about the requirements of the programmes they desire.

After they have been admitted, the next task is to arrange how they can be picked once they land in Kenya and taken to the university. They can be picked from the airport or border points depending on how they have traveled into the country.

Currently, Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuru and Eldoret are the MKU campuses with foreign students.

After they arrive, the ISC office assists students to comply with immigration requirements. Largely, this is to help them acquire a student pass that is mandatory. “They can then proceed to pursue their studies without any hassles,” Mr Munyasia notes.He added that his office’s other responsibility is coordinate how the students live in the country. This is important because most international students stay in Kenya when the university closes a semester. In particular, the office has to arrange how their health needs will be met.