U.S. schools compete for Saudi students

Kingdom gives scholarships to thousands for new exchange program

The Associated Press Updated: 5:03 p.m. ET Sept. 9, 2006

MANHATTAN, Kan. - Thousands of students from Saudi Arabia are enrolling on

college campuses across the United States this semester under a new

educational exchange program brokered by President Bush and Saudi King

Abdullah.

The program will quintuple the number of Saudi students and scholars here by

the academic year's end. And big, public universities from Florida to the

Kansas plains are in a fierce competition for their tuition dollars.

The kingdom's royal family - which is paying full scholarships for most of

the 15,000 students - says the program will help

stem unrest at home by schooling the country's brightest in the American

tradition. The U.S. State Department sees the exchange as a way to build

ties with future Saudi leaders and young scholars at a time of unsteady

relations with the Muslim world.