Friday, December 8, 2023
Debt driven International students face financial fears Bella Casey News and Lifestyle Assistant Editor
puter science. She has a passion for coding and worked as a software developer in India. Then she worked for OSU Dining Services. She had to pay for her education. “After working as a software developer and coming Sai Parvatharaju is afraid back working at this student to break her arm. dining services, it was pretty She cannot afford to pay hard for me, but it was a good any hospital bills. She must experience,” Parvatharaju said. save money. As some students navigate She misses out on vacacollege on their parents’ dime, tions with friends. She worked international students such as two jobs over the summer. She Parvatharaju and Ng must work lives with roommates. to survive. One academic year She must spend money as a graduate international carefully. student costs $50,488, accordShe is saving her money ing to OSU. to buy a ticket home to her famMost international stuily. To pay off her student loans. dents at OSU are in the U.S. on To get an education. an F-1 visa, which is a student “But it’s all worth it,” said visa that is privately financed. Zhe Kai Ng, an international Students must provide a finanstudent from Malaysia who is cial guarantee of $40,000 to be getting his master’s in nutriapproved. This proves they can tional science. afford their education. Parvatharaju is an international student from India who See Woes on 4A is getting a master’s in com-
Dead longhorn draws national attention, investigation ongoing Kennedy Thomason News & Lifestyle Editor
Courtesy of Zhina Shirzad Zhina Shirzad left Afghanistan in 2021, when the American troops left the country. Since then, she struggles to feel at home.
OSU resettlement program gives refugees opportunity to start over Luisa Clausen Editor-in-Chief
When the Taliban took over, Zhina Shirzad left Afghanistan and couldn’t look back. No family. No friends. Just a desperate need to survive. Back home, she left her mother and siblings, with whom she said she has a deep connection. Although Shirzard grew up listening to the sound of bombs and danger, she never saw it with her own eyes. “(Before the Taliban took over) It happened around my office, I heard sounds,” Shirzard said. “It was better before. It was not safe but everyone could go work. Everyone could have education.” Back home, her family believed in education. She graduated with an economics degree, she learned English and she worked hard. Shirzad believed women deserved education. But the Taliban believed the opposite. “When the schools
What’s Inside
closed for women or girls maybe you can’t believe me but I cried for more than four or five days,” Shirzad said. Shirzard decided to leave the country, but her family couldn’t follow her. Shirzard wanted a chance to be free, but when she got to the airport, she didn’t know where they would take her. At the time, thousands of Afghans were being relocated to different countries. And in August 2021, 90,000 were on their way to the U.S. Her journey was long. Three days in Qatar, then Germany for two months at a military camp, New Mexico for two months and finally, Oklahoma. Shirzad lived in Tulsa for a few months until she received a scholarship opportunity to study at Oklahoma State University. For her, education was freedom. So she grabbed her few belongings and moved to Stillwater. In a partnership with Catholic Charities of Eastern Oklahoma, OSU created the Afghan Family Project, which welcomed Shirzad, while trying to manage an overwhelming demand.
Flowers in December? Must be pre-finals week
Emily Boersma, director of the English Language and Intercultural Center, joined the project in August 2022, and said the hard work had been done but there was a long way to go. “Initially it was a crisis management,” Boersma said. “When I started, we began stabilizing, and we began with resettlement.” Before a more prepared phase of the project started, volunteers such as Terri Hollarn were fundamental in helping Afghan refugees settle in Stillwater. Hollarn’s mom was a refugee, so she knew she needed to help. Hollarn called the person in charge of the settling of refugees and offered to help out for six hours a week. She had been retired for a year and said she decided to utilize her time for something good. “Now Terri, did you actually volunteer six hours a week?” Boersma asked, during a group interview for The O’Colly. “So… the next day, I started working between six and 12 hours a day,” Hollarn said with a laugh. And it only went up from that. See Refugees on 4A
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longhorn placed on the attached trailer, backed onto the lawn. A cord attached to the house and longhorn pulled the carcass off the trailer as the truck drove away. OSU, President Dr. Kayse Shrum and FarmHouse released A dead longhorn has statements the same day regardturned campus on its head. ing the carcass. The longhorn, found out“We expect that authoriside of the FarmHouse fraternity ties will prosecute this case to on the morning of Dec. 1, drew the full extent of the law, and national attention. The O’Colly we stand with the Stillwater broke the news, and it trended community in condemning this across social media and major reprehensible act, which in no media outlets over the weekend way represents the values of our such as ESPN, The New York institution,” Shrum said in her Post and Daily Mail. statement. Beginning with initial reThe incident came one ports of the carcass with “F*** day before OSU’s Big 12 ChamFH” carved into its side and a pionship matchup against the cut along its abdomen exposing University of Texas and trended its intestines, the story quickly because of the connection to evolved. Texas’ mascot, Bevo the longAt 6:39 a.m. on Dec. 1, horn. the Stillwater Police DepartHowever, Lt. TJ Low of ment received information that the Stillwater Police Department a dead longhorn was placed on said it had no connection. the front lawn of FarmHouse. “I just want to make sure They responded, confirming the that everyone is clear that it longhorn was dead and removdoesn’t have anything to do with ing it just after 9 a.m. the Big 12 Championship in any Footage circulated among way,” Low said. “It seemed like students of the guilty party a little rivalry between the two disposing of the longhorn on fraternities.” the front lawn. A truck, with the See Longhorn on 4A
Kennedy Thomason A dead longhorn outside of the FarmHouse fraternity was reported to the Stillwater Police Department at 6:39 a.m. on Dec. 1.
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