The creation of the International Intramural Student Sports League at Saint Louis University will not only present current students with visions of ping pong and badminton that are far more intense than the sports’ previous reputation as after-dinner lawn activities; the league will also work to integrate a huge but currently isolated section of SLU’s population into University life.

Enrollment of Chinese students has skyrocketed within the past year; of the 275 international students, 75 percent are Chinese, and many arrive with limited English skills. This presents the campus with a large demographic of students for whom communication and activity within the University is a challenge. The tendency to remain in homogeneous groups is easy to understand: language barriers, as well as cultural ones, are hard to overcome, especially if there is no structured vehicle to do so.

With the International Intramural Student Sports League, the University is not attempting to create a special, segregated league-all are invited, as long as the team contains a few international students. Here the University means to provide an outlet for activities that correspond to these students’ unique cultural backgrounds. Most international students were not raised on notoriously American sports like football or baseball, and thus are not as inclined to participate in those established team activities here at SLU; this would demand they learn of new rules on top of the already difficult language barrier.

The International Intramural Student Sports League would provide activities like badminton, ping pong and basketball, sports more familiar to international students. Furthermore, the emphasis on Asian participation in particular will foster a sense of comfort, camaraderie and involvement in a SLU recreational activity. In turn, the creation of this league will provide every other SLU student with exposure and access to culturally diverse forms of recreation.

The growing number of new international students get the opportunity to have fun and be involved in a sport, and everyone else gets to be blown away by just how awesome badminton can be. Everybody wins.