Tunisian friend wants to come to USA to study... Need advice

[aftermeednight 0]

I know a tunisian sister (very good friend of mine), she wants to come to the USA to study, (english to arabic translation - no such courses in Tunisia) and she can't get a scholarship, because there are basically no scholarships for north africans in america (I guess north africans 'aren't considered african' in the scholarship sense).  She has a very high GPA (the tunisian equivalent). The only one we found was the fullbright (which the embassy workers give to their families, so that is out of the question).

 

Do you know of any scholarships or any other way she can come here?

 

She says student visas are basically impossible to get without a scholarship... 

 

Ideas? 
 

[KurosawaSan 52]

First of all, it is absolutely not true that it's impossible to get a visa without a scholarship. There are several ways in which you can tackle the problem:

1. Self-fund. This means you provide your own funds, from a bank account that you (or in this case, your friend) owns - family counts as well. 
2. Take out a loan. I am not sure what the financial situation is in Tunisia, but generally there are ways to take a bank loan to fund the education.
3. Keep looking for scholarships. Yes, indeed, just being from Africa is not the same as African-American (which has a scholarship category in the US). That said, there are plenty of other scholarships available. Her best bet is to find universities she is interested in and start reaching out to professors and department chairs - find out what's available, share her CV and goals, etc.

As of Fulbright, I've known plenty of people that have no affiliation with embassy officials that have gotten it.

[NigeriaorBust 4,087]

  More corrupt embassy tend to show favoritism in who is in line for the Fulbright,  That being said there are millions of bright students that would love to come to the US if school was covered.  Your friend is competing with all these people.  Because of this they are going to have to look very hard for scholarships. Has she thought of getting a job and seeing if the employer will help ?