LSU’s Hector Zapata helps international students adapt to a new culture and way of life
For international students, adjusting to their new home in Baton Rouge can be like learning to speak a foreign language.
And for some, like Hector Zapata, the language barrier is just one of many challenges.
When Zapata arrived at LSU as an international college student, he barely spoke English. But with the school’s support, he learned and adapted quickly.
Years later, he’s still at LSU—serving as associate vice provost for International Programs and helping make Baton Rouge feel like home away from home for students going through experiences similar to his own.
Around 110 countries were represented by 1,647 international students just this past spring semester at LSU, with most students hailing from India, Iran and China. Zapata wears many hats making sure those students receive a soft landing from their home country.
The International Programs department introduces students to the Louisiana experience by connecting them with visiting scholars, the International Cultural Center and Administration, Development & Outreach.
Zapata has also prioritized helping domestic students leave home and experience other cultures through studying abroad. In 2014, he co-founded LSU Global, a partnership with Shorelight Education, an organization that works with universities to help international students thrive. LSU Global recruits international students to the university. A small percentage of their tuition is used for the Study Abroad Scholarship Program and the International Research Grant Program, in hopes of expanding Louisiana students’ participation in study abroad.
The scholarship program also brings domestic and international students together through a variety of activities, where they can learn about each other’s cultures.
As an added incentive, for each activity they participate in, students earn points that they can use toward scholarships for study abroad programs or international research.
The program is meant to mature and educate the students, Zapata says—but also offer a connection to another part of the world that, without LSU, they’d never gain.
“I came to Louisiana to study English many years ago. So I went through the English language and orientation program here at LSU. And I went through the student life just like any other student. My native country was Honduras, so I came like a kid trying to figure out what was happening. And so drawing from those experiences and how great that experience was, but then how I had to either sink or swim, it occurred to me that that would be totally unfair to go and recruit worldwide and not provide a mechanism of adaptation to the students, so that when they come to campus right away they become much more intelligent about student life. About the LSU life. About the city of Baton Rouge.” – Hector Zapata
Read more from our cover story, featuring people standing up to solve racial issues in Baton Rouge.
This article was originally published in the June 2017 issue of 225 Magazine.
