Jutarat Sawatpoon (L), a foreign exchange student from Thailand, boards a school bus outside her host family's home in Marietta, South Dakota February 14, 2012. This year, 11 students from China, Thailand, Germany and elsewhere account for nearly 20% of high school enrollment, bringing cash and a welcome splash of diversity to an isolated patch of the Great Plains. Grant-Deuel is not alone. Across the United States, public high schools in struggling small towns are putting their empty classroom seats up for sale.
REUTERS/Jim Young
Enrollment is dropping at some rural schools, but officials have an improbable plan to save their schools -- by turning them into magnets for wealthy foreign students