"Bright students get pushed toward engineering and medicine," he says. "If you achieve something in life, it has to be in the sciences".

Gilika was accepted to study medicine, but he decided he wouldn't follow the path he was pressured to take. Instead, he enrolled at United World College (UWC) in Montezuma, New Mexico.

The school - one of 12 around the world - is home to 200 students from 75 countries. During the two-year program, Gilika followed a rigorous academic curriculum and earned an international baccalaureate degree.

His decision may not have been the one his family expected, but it was one they understood: his father was a UWC graduate as well.

Gilika believed the experience would be something like a sabbatical, after which he'd return to Botswana and attend medical school.

Instead, it was more like a launching pad into a new world. He decided to stay in the United States. "I really got into internationalism, and I started researching colleges that focused on that," he says. "Over and over, Macalester came up at the top of the list".

At the urging of another Macalester student from Botswana, who was also a UWC graduate, he enrolled. Now a sophomore, Gilika is one of 93 UWC alumni on campus.

Thanks in part to the UWC, Macalester has been able to continue to attract hundreds of students from around the world who meet the college's strict academic standards. Since 1986, when Mac started recruiting UWC students, 258 have enrolled, helping give Macalester a large pool of international students that few other liberal arts colleges can match.

A new $13.5 million gift by Shelby Moore Cullom Davis will make Macalester even more attractive to UWC graduates. Until this year, Davis UWC Scholars were awarded up to $10,000 in need-based aid annually to help defray tuition costs.

While that's a significant scholarship by any measure, many UWC students come from very modest backgrounds and need additional scholarships or loans. There is the Kofi Annan International Scholarship in addition to his Davis UWC Scholarship. Davis's new gift, the largest in Macalester's history earmarked for international scholarships, will double that annual amount to $20,000, based on a student's need, for students entering in fall 2008.

Davis, founder of the mutual fund and money management firm Davis Advisors, says the decision to give was easy. "UWC students are so motivated and hungry for knowledge," Davis says. "The UWC mission is to achieve peace and understanding through education. These students pick this up rapidly and want to make a difference in the world. So that makes me a passionate giver, to follow that lead." His commitment goes beyond Macalester. Each year, Davis donates more than $20 million to colleges to support international education.

Although the Davis scholarships go exclusively to UWC graduates, the entire campus benefits from the diverse perspectives these students bring to classrooms and dorm rooms.

UWC graduate and Davis Scholar, Claire Schuch '11, has circled the globe to get her education, moving from her home near Utrenct, The Netherlands, to a UWC school in Singapore before landing at Macalester.

She joined two classmates from her UWC class at Macalester but her busy schedule - soccer, modern dance, and teaching English to immigrants - greatly widened her circle of friends.

Because UWC graduates have already spent two years with classmates from every corner of the globe, Macalester, which boasts students from 87 countries, representing 12 percent of the student population, doesn't seem like such an overwhelming leap. They were quickly engaged.

As the world grows increasingly interconnected through trade and politics, and as complex issues such as global warming demand action and consensus from many, it will become even more important for leaders around the world to be able to communicate effectively.

They will need to be able to understand different perspectives and work well together. At Macalester, these important conversations begin.

Gilika, an economics and geography major, knows that whatever work he ultimately pursues, he will be expected to represent Botswana well. But he also knows that he will have to show evidence of his study at UWC.