Tuesday morning, 53 students and 11 sponsors from four schools in the Dominican Republic touched down at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on their way to BJU.
Their trek is a result of a trip Dr. Matthew Weathers, director of international student relations, and junior actuarial science student Manny Hiciano Torres took last semester. Weathers and Hiciano spent a week in the Dominican visiting schools and recruiting students for BJU. “We invited them to visit for College Up Close and many responded,” said Weathers.
“The large number of international students also means this is going to be the largest College Up Close we have ever had,” said University host Andrew Carter. During the trip, students will tour campus, explore downtown Greenville, experience residence hall life, visit classes and chapel, and interact with students, faculty and staff. As Frank Abel Castillo from Colegio Bautista Cristiano said, “We want to learn the experience of taking classes and how it is to live a Bob Jones University student life.”
This is why Hiciano is excited to have fellow Dominican students visit. He said, “I want Dominican high school students to live a BJU day-to-day life. … They will see how a university abroad operates, and they will broaden their point of view on how universities operate other than the ones back home. … (We) may have a perspective on how the university is from the webpage, but living the experience gives you a different perspective.”
The students are excited to be at BJU, too. Juan Brea, whose brother Gabriel graduated from BJU in 2016, said, “I want to see everything.” He is looking forward to visiting classes and seeing how different they are from classes in the Dominican.
Though the group arrived on campus just last night, BJU has already made a favorable impression. A recent graduate of Colegio Bautista Cristiano preparing for his first year of college, Allan Guzman said he felt “confident and comfortable” because of BJU’s current Dominican students. “They are friendly with us, and they understand us,” he said. Castillo said of the BJU community as a whole, “Everybody here is so nice and kind.”
Castillo also said the best part of the trip for him, so far, has been the information he’s received. “It’s like the information that you really need,” he said. “It’s not very overwhelming. You get what you really want to learn. … And it’s very helpful for us.” His classmate Javier Morales stated it this way: “This University has so many opportunities to study. It’s an excellent work to (go) here to study what I really want.”
Senior English student from the Dominican Republic Abril Brito Mones expects the result of more Dominican students attending BJU. “Several decades ago, there was a great amount of Christian Dominican students at BJU,” she said. “That generation is now faithfully serving their country and their ministries. Just imagining what this new generation could do with a BJU education gets me excited.”
