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International Students & Scholars Office (ISSO)

  • ISSO is here to help you get settled on campus and answer your questions about immigration, employment, housing, finances and other issues as you begin your studies at BU
  • In conjunction with Boston University Orientation, ISSO offers new student orientation sessions for international students to provide you with critical visa information as well as assistance with cultural and academic adjustment

My name is Reina. I'm majoring in psychology, and I'm from Beirut, Lebanon. One of the reasons I decided to come to BU is because I wanted to be around lots of different international students in one place and experience lots of different cultures. BU definitely has one of the largest international student populations in the US. I think it's somewhere around the top 15.

Hi, I'm Arnab Gogoi. I'm an electrical engineer with a minor in economics. And I'm from India, but I was brought up in Kuwait. There's a huge process to getting visa, coming over here and immigration. So what the ISSO does for us is they really made the process easier. They lay everything out for you.

And then once you get them done, they do all the paperwork, send it to the right people. And then they get back to you with your visa. They just make the process a lot easier. It's like a helping hand.

When you want to travel outside of the United States as an international student, it's very important that you have the sheet of paper called the I20 with you at all times. And the ISSO makes sure that you have that paper, it has all your information on it.

When I personally got employed, they helped me with the application process for a social security number. They just make sure everything's running smoothly. And they also have advisors that you can go and see on an on call basis if you have any questions at all or if you need help with anything.