Dive Brief:

• The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has nearly 5,000 Chinese students, the largest enrollment of students from China of any school in the U.S. — and the size of the enrollment has implications for the school, Inside Higher Ed reports.
• In 2000, the university’s undergraduate Chinese enrollment was 37, with 649 graduate students.
• The university has 684 freshmen from China, which is more than from any other country or state, other than Illinois and California.

Dive Insight:

According to Inside Higher Ed’s article, the downsides to the large Chinese enrollment include racist attitudes from non-Chinese students who resent the large population of students, and social cliques that form when it’s easy for Chinese students to socialize mainly with other students from China. Also, faculty members were unprepared for the university’s increase in international students, and some university services didn’t have the resources to deal with the large numbers.