Education: But Where Are Their Chaperones?

A novel exchange program brings Soviet students to U.S. colleges

Killu Tyugu, 21, a thoughtful Soviet college student, remembers when the rector of Tartu State University in Estonia asked if anyone wanted to go to America. "Everyone laughed and said, 'He is a humorous man.' We didn't believe him," says Tyugu, a molecular-biology major. "But when he went on to ask, 'Who would like to apply for an exchange program?' I thought, Why not take a risk?" This autumn Tyugu is enrolled at Ohio's Oberlin College, while 55 of her Soviet peers are at 25 other liberal-arts colleges in eight states. The arrangement is part of an unprecedented Soviet-American undergraduate swap...

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