"I am proud of our student exchange programmes in Pakistan, which are the largest anywhere in the world and demonstrate the depth of our commitment to Pakistan's young people," said Ambassador Olson. He said that the US government will continue to cooperate with Pakistan in the social sector. The US government fully funds these fellowships for the entire period of study. The United States Educational Foundation in Pakistan (USEFP) administers the program and held a pre-departure orientation session on December 14-15.
"The really exciting thing about this group of undergraduates is that...so many of these students come from remote or economically disadvantaged areas of Pakistan", said Executive Director USEFP Rita Akhtar. She said that the group included 31 students from Punjab, 25 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 22 from Sindh, 17 from Gilgit-Baltistan, four from Fata, 5 from Islamabad, seven from Balochistan and two from Azad Kashmir.
Of them, 46 percent of the students were women, she said. She said that the students would be pursuing a wide variety of disciplines, including humanities and social science subjects, engineering, basic sciences, law, art and design, economics, and business administration. They would be attending more than 50 different colleges and universities located throughout the United States, she added.
The Global UGRAD programme was launched in the fall of 2010 when the first cohort of as many as 50 students departed for the US. More than 400 students have participated in the programme so far. Whereas under the USEFP administered exchange programmes, nearly 4,000 Pakistanis and more than 800 Americans have participated in the programme since its inception over 62 years ago, Rita added.