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[Audio] Meet Claire Dunning, a Murray State International Student Recruiter

There isn't a typical day at Murray State University's Institute for International Studies says Claire Alcott Dunning. She's an International Student Counselor and when she's not doing social media work for the program, she's booking trips around the world, representing the university to prospective students. On Sounds Good, Matt Markgraf speaks with Dunning about what it's like traveling the world and her upcoming trip this October.

Traveling to Pakistan

Right now she's booking tickets to Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Her job is to recruit international students to come study at Murray State University. This tour started with an Education USA Tour planned by the US Embassy for universities from all over the country to participate.

Hindi and Urdu are similar languages, so spending a year learning Hindi she feels confident getting by in Urdu while in Pakistan. She can talk and give speeches in Urdu and is brushing up on her writing. The clothes they wear in Pakistan are very flowing and beautiful, she says, and is digging out her outfits from her last visit. But the fun part isn't packing, it's going!

What a Recruiter Does

During the tour, she'll go to various fairs to meet hundreds or even thousands of students who want to come study in the United States. She'll also visit high schools to talk to younger students about studying at MSU, from topics ranging from tuition, programs, facilities, what everyday life is like to pop-culture things like Taylor Swift.

In Universities in other countries, students are very used to lecture halls, so at a school like Murray State, where there's a 16 to 1 student faculty ratio and where you can actually meet professors and talk to them during office hours is different than what many international students are used to. So too are extracurricular activities like clubs, fraternities and sororities.

Growing Up with an International Perspective

Dunning says she grew up traveling and comes from an international family. Her father is an international businessman and her stepfather is international as well, a retired master sergeant who now teaches poetry, who adopted two girls from Korea while he was stationed there. She says she grew up traveling in the summers to places from Sri Lanka to Brazil to Spain. Going overseas with her family made interacting in countries where English isn't the main language much easier. She had fun picking up languages and being a translator, something she still enjoys now.

American Stereotypes?

There are stereotypes and people do have an idea of what American culture is that isn't completely true. Often, people think that all of the United States is what you see in movies and they don't think of the differences between the Midwest, the East Coast, the West Coast, etc. She says she ends up explaining that a lot to people, but also enjoys learning about the differences in their countries, too, because likewise it's not the same as it appears in movies.

Advice for Travelers

Be open to new ideas. Be able to question yourself. Be able to think about things that you think are normal, that you grew up with and put those into perspective. Don't always assume that the way you were taught to do something is the only way to do it.

Favorite Place

It's a hard question to answer, Dunning says. Some of her favorite places are the ones she's been able to spend more time in. Some of her time in high school was in Vienna, Austria, where she lived with a host family - and it wasn't like The Sound of Music. She enjoyed going out with friends and because it was a business school, many of her classmates had also studied abroad, which was a unique experience. Students wore suits and classes ranged from business and economics to drink mixing. Students in Europe decided what they wanted to do as a career much earlier than students in the US.

A place she'd love to visit someday? Dunning says she's heard a lot about it and would love to visit because it seems so different.

How Traveling Has Shaped Perspective

"I love the idea that I'm part of the world and not just my country and I love the idea that I've had to represent the values from my country starting from a very young age." Dunning says she learned at a young age that the country was built on immigrants, people from all over the world blending cultures to become American. Traveling helped her reaffirm this thought.

She chose Murray State because it's a regional university, most students coming from the surrounding area and who may have not had many international experiences. Murray State is now comprised of almost 10% international students and it amazed her coming here that so many international students were teaching American students and that so many students joining the Study Abroad programs, "I thought that was really incredible, that students from a smaller, regional place would have all of these kinds of big experiences."

Why International is Important

In order to be a desirable candidate for a job today, she says, you have to be aware of other cultures and countries. If you can speak a couple of languages, you'll have a much better time working in a world where everyone's traveling a little bit and exposed to international economies, businesses and ideas.

International Students at Murray State Facebook page

Murray State International Instagram page

Matt Markgraf joined the WKMS team as a student in January 2007. He's served in a variety of roles over the years: as News Director March 2016-September 2019 and previously as the New Media & Promotions Coordinator beginning in 2011. Prior to that, he was a graduate and undergraduate assistant. He is currently the host of the international music show Imported on Sunday nights at 10 p.m.
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