Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - The number of US students enrolled in Jordanian higher education institutions has increased 38 per cent from last year, according to an annual report by the Institute of International Education, with support from the US State Department's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

The Open Doors report for 2017/2018 shows that 1,017 Americans are studying in Jordanian universities, during the most recent academic year for which data is available.

"This growing number of Americans enrolled in Jordanian universities reflects the high caliber of Jordan academic institutions and an increased interest in Middle Eastern Studies and Arabic language learning in Jordan among American students," John Hishmeh, Assistant Cultural Affairs Officer at the US Embassy in Amman said.

The number of Jordanian students enrolled in US universities and colleges grew 0.6% to 2,435, a figure which does not include students with dual Jordanian-US citizenship.

In another positive development, Jordan ranked 6th in the Middle East/North Africa region for the overall number of Jordanian students going to the United States, marking an improvement from last year’s 7th place ranking, according to a press release by the US embassy.

It said that with the increasing number of American students coming to Jordan, the ratio of Jordanians studying in the United States to Americans in Jordan has improved dramatically to approximately 2 to 1, respectively.

Overall, the number of international students at US colleges and universities is 1,095,299 for the 2018-19 academic year, surpassing one million for the fourth year in a row, it said.