Orange County is popular with international high school students

Jeffrey was 13 when the Gaos uprooted their lives in China, leaving behind family, friends and familiar sights, choosing to start anew in Irvine so their son could have a shot at attending a top American university.

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Today Jeffrey Gao is in graduate school at New York University, with bachelor’s degrees in international political economy, mathematics and computer science from Georgetown University.

He is part of an international community that has flocked to Orange County for its learning opportunities.

Gao was born in the United States, but moved with his family to China at the age of 3. Roughly a decade later, they returned to California, where Gao enrolled at Sage Hill School.

“Education was a main consideration,” Gao said. “I think (my parents and I) sort of always knew that I would be at least going to college in the United States.”

These international students are not necessarily immigrants seeking “the American Dream.” What these international students — some may end up staying beyond college, some will return home — seek is an American education. There’s even a phrase in Mandarin: “péi dú,” which means to accompany a child or spouse who is completing an education overseas.

The students often come from higher-income brackets, and their families can afford to buy Orange County homes in the school districts they want or enroll the children in private schools.

Some schools have recognized an opportunity, launching dedicated international student programs to help their new pupils acclimate to American life and prepare for college applications.

And that addition of resources and exposure to international cultures is positively impacting education for all in Orange County, the educators say.

Gao, now 22, said his high school community was distinctly shaped by its international student population. Though Sage Hill School does not facilitate a formal program, plenty of Gao’s friends and classmates shared an international background, he said, whether they were born here and raised abroad or emigrated right before high school.

“Multiculturalism is at the very core of Sage,” Gao said, “and I think that’s one of the appeals of the school where you get to experience a lot of different cultures (and) you get to talk with peers from very different cultural backgrounds.”

One option for a foreign student to attend high school in the country is an F-1 student visa, which allows long-term study at Student and Exchange Visitor Program-certified schools, or a J-1 visa for temporary exchange programs. F-1 students usually come seeking a U.S. high school diploma.

A 2024 report by the Institute of International Education looking at the last decade said that 45% of U.S. colleges and universities “targeted undergraduate recruitment of international students attending U.S. high schools.” And, as of 2024, the report said the vast majority of international students were from Asia and Europe, and more than half of all F-1 visa holders were from Asia — it’s a trend Orange County school administrators said they also see.

Orange County’s combination of favorable weather, public safety, proximity to University of California schools and its already existing global community all help attract international families to the area, said Rob Birdsell, executive vice president of Amerigo, an international education service provider that partners with secondary schools across the U.S., Canada and the United Kingdom to connect them with international students.

While the federal government has targeted visa programs — new restrictions for F-1 visas go into effect this month — Orange County has remained a coveted destination, Birdsell said.

“The international market has been, as you might expect, a challenging market the past few years,” Birdsell said. “Orange County is one of the few markets that still is quite strong.

“Orange County has stayed pretty steady, if anything, grown.”

Amerigo has placed 125 students from eight countries in several schools across the area, including private high schools and schools in the Anaheim Union and Placentia-Yorba Linda School districts over the last decade, Birdsell said.

“They’re global citizens, and they help our schools become more relevant than if they only had domestic students,” Birdsell said. “Spending your high school years with students from around the world, I think, is transformative.”

Birdsell and co-founder David Napier started Amerigo in 2016. The program also assists students in finding living accommodations. At first, it was more common for students to move to America by themselves, Birdsell said. Now, family members have become more involved in their students’ educational experience, he said.

“These past few years, there has been an uptick in self-accommodation, where a family is coming — often a mother coming, working on the visa process, while the husband stays behind with his job — or a family member or relative is already here,” Birdsell said.

“California just has great higher education, and students have a higher likelihood of going to a great institution if they study (in the U.S.) in high school,” Birdsell said. The third-party company guarantees admission to top-100 ranked American universities. “Plus, certain universities don’t actually take applicants from certain countries unless they study here.”

At Oxford Academy — which has been ranked among the top three public high schools in the state by U.S. News & World Report for nearly two decades — international students are a staple in the community. The Cypress magnet school not only draws high-achieving students from across the district, but also the world.

Principal Amber Houston said the Anaheim Union High School District’s international student program has welcomed more than 150 students in recent years, consistently placing both short- and long-term students in schools across the district.

The program is mutually beneficial for international and domestic students, Houston said, allowing for a multicultural exchange that enhances the public education experience.

“Our parents think it’s very valuable (for their students) to have that multicultural influence, that firsthand experience of being open-minded and learning about people and appreciating diversity,” Houston said. “I think they love the fact that their kids are getting primary sources of different perspectives from around the world.”

AUHSD is one of only two public school districts in Orange County that are Student and Exchange Visitor Program certified and can allow F-1 students to live locally and enroll as full-time students for the academic year.

“Education can be very limited in other countries that have these big standardized tests,” Houston said. “In some cases, if you don’t score well enough, you don’t get to keep going in your education. There’s a lot of class systems that still exist. You can come here (and) still have that opportunity to further your education.”

Houston is a strong proponent of the international student presence in her city. Even before the program arrived at Oxford, the Houstons had served as a host family for several foreign exchange students, she said.

International students develop enduring relationships with the communities they join, she added. And her family now spends every other Christmas with a former student and her family in Barcelona.

When AUHSD’s International Student Relations and Services Coordinator David Green first approached her about launching the opportunity, Houston said she was eager to bring the experience to her community.

“It’s been something that’s very close to my heart. As soon as I heard about it, I said, ‘Let’s do it,’” said Houston, who has helped recruit overseas partners in China, Myanmar, Vietnam, Japan and India.

Oxford senior Kenzie Laing spent time getting to know some of the international students in her classes, which she wrote about in a 2025 article for the school newspaper, The Gamut.

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Speaking with students from China and Vietnam, Laing said they shared an interest in developing English proficiency but also becoming proficient in American culture — so they could talk sports and pop culture in college.

“We get to know them and they’re truly a part of our daily lives at Oxford,” Laing said. “I’ve always been personally fascinated with learning about other cultures, and it was great just getting to compare backgrounds, personal experiences, differences in our school systems.”

The district’s international student program has been running for roughly 12 years. In the last four years, AUHSD has enrolled 176 international students across its seven campuses, with its largest numbers at Kennedy and Cypress high schools, according to a district report.

Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District, the only other certified Orange County public school district that allows international students to fully enroll at any of its campuses, recently held its third annual international student orientation luncheon, which welcomed incoming students from 11 countries.

PYLUSD’s international student program welcomed its first cohort in 2015, after the district’s attendance director read about the financial benefits of a program in Kern County. Throughout PYLUSD and AUHSD, international student tuition fees have helped support the larger school population, according to reports from both districts. PYLUSD, for example, gains roughly $17,500 to $18,500 per student in tuition revenue.

Of PYLUSD’s 35 international students for the 2026-27 school year, 28 are attending on F-1 student visas, while seven are dual U.S. citizens, according to PYLUSD spokesperson Lorely Meza. Nearly half of the students hail from Italy, with others coming from China, Germany, South Korea, Switzerland, Brazil, Finland, Poland, Serbia, Spain and Vietnam.

PYLUSD’s international partnerships allow students to “build meaningful connections and lasting friendships” steeped in cross-cultural exchange, Meza said.

Orange County’s public schools serve more than 400,000 students across 28 districts. While there is no way to formally document the international student community  — per state and federal laws, public schools cannot collect information regarding the citizenship or immigration status of students — several school districts report high interest from students and families who self-identify their international status.

In the Irvine Unified School District, a variety of English language development programs and community resources offer support for students and families who are new to the country or in need of multilingual communication systems, officials said. Over time, these resources have expanded to accommodate the growing community.

“IUSD has historically been a draw for families for many reasons and from many locations both internationally and domestically,” district spokesperson Annie Brown said.

At Capistrano Valley Christian Schools, a robust international student community has helped to positively shape the curriculum and campus environment, said Heidi Zameni, the school’s director of international students.

Zameni spearheads the 20-year-old program created after the San Juan Capistrano school received several inquiries from international families hoping to enroll their students.

The additional stream of students has helped the school grow its offerings for all, including adding Advanced Placement courses.

“Twenty years ago, we didn’t even offer calculus, because we just didn’t have the numbers,” Zameni said. “As we started enrolling international students, their math was always higher than the American level math — I would say a majority of the time — and so we began offering calculus, because there were three international students that wanted it.”

The high school now offers both AP Calculus AB and BC, as well as AP Physics. There’s now also a robotics team and badminton program, which one Chinese international student started as a club two years ago.

The sport quickly gained popularity among both international and American students and is now offered as an after-school physical education credit, Zameni said.

“They’ve brought a lot into our school community,” Principal James Walker said. “Then, we’re seeing domestic students participating in those things, and pushing themselves and challenging themselves along those lines, too.”

About 10% of the school’s population are members of the international student program, Zameni said.

Many hope to develop their English-speaking skills and study fields that may not be as widely available in their home countries, she said, adding that many favor the educational environment here, too.

Jingnan Liu, a senior, said her parents wanted her to enjoy her education outside of China’s intense academic environment.

“They believed that here, I could better develop my hobby — drawing,” Liu said. “When I was in my home country, I studied every day (and) didn’t have a lot of time to do my own things. After I came here, I got more time to spend on what I really want to do.”

Liu, who has participated in the school’s various art programs, said she hopes to continue studying illustration in college — a pathway she wouldn’t have been able to pursue in China.

Freshman Zouy Chen, also from China, said her parents had a similar intention.

“(My parents) didn’t want me to struggle with studying,” Chen said. “That was the main difference between the U.S. and China.”

Both Chen and Liu have adjusted well to life in America. Chen said she has made meaningful relationships with friends and teachers, and Liu said she feels well supported by her peers.

The Trump administration’s changes to the country’s immigration policy may affect the future of international student programs locally.

Meza said PYLUSD saw a decrease in enrollment during the 2025-26 school year due to changes in the federal policy, which stalled visa application appointments overseas for about three weeks between May and June 2025.

The administration finalized a rule in July limiting the number of years for which a student visa can be valid. It goes into affect this month.

Zameni said changes to the student visa application process and restrictions on the duration of stay may make it more difficult for international students to stay in the U.S. from high school to college, though it’s too early to tell.

“I don’t think (the federal policy change) is going to affect the enrollment at all — Orange County has always been super attractive for international families,” Zameni said, “but otherwise we’re not quite sure.”

“The value of international students, whether it’s higher education or high school, is that you are bringing a global worldview to the American population,” Zameni said. “International students are really enriching our campus.”

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