At Syracuse, nearly one of every 10 students comes from a foreign country. On its swimming and diving teams, it’s one out of three.On the current roster, SU features 11 students from outside the United States, eight of those from outside of North America. Included in that group are athletes from Russia, Turkey, Poland, Israel, Norway and the Czech Republic.This weekend, they will each call Syracuse home when the Orange hosts Seton Hall in a dual meet on Saturday.While SU has added international students to its team three of the last four years, there was a drastic increase this year when four freshmen – Arda Isiksalan, Alex Taraskin, Boldizsar Kiss and Moshe Kohen – came from overseas. Head coach Lou Walker said that he made no changes to his normal recruiting tactics but received more interest from international students.’Their credentials were exceptional and they were interested in coming,’ Walker said. ‘We were able to get it done.’Freshman Arda Isiksalan, who hails from Istanbul, Turkey, decided long ago that he wanted to come to the United States and swim. Compared to his home country, the United States offers better opportunities for swimmers of his age.’It was my goal, like when I was really young,’ Isiksalan said. ‘USA is better in swimming so I wanted to improve my swimming.’As of late, advances in communication technology have helped in international recruiting. For Walker, it’s much easier now to contact a recruit overseas than it was when he started his job more than 30 years ago. The differences between recruiting at home and abroad are shrinking.’It’s the same general process,’ Walker said. ‘There’s correspondence that occurs. There are phone calls that occur. It’s really the same. The world has gotten smaller and smaller and that certainly applies to that process.’The world may have shrunk in a figurative sense, but swimmers from Europe and Asia are still an ocean away from their family and friends.’Sometimes I feel homesick, but it’s OK,’ Isiksalan said. ‘We are so busy and you don’t have time for missing home.’All four of the freshmen are from countries where English is not the primary language, producing a language barrier when they came to SU in the fall. While they had learned a fair amount of English, there is a large difference between the English taught from a textbook and the English of the college student, Walker said.’My friends help me lots,’ Isiksalan said. ‘My coach is really good at communication with international students. You know we have lots of international students and we have a good relationship with everyone on the team.’In his communication with international students, Walker is aided by the fact that swimming often focuses on numbers, whether they are yards or times. This helps him break the language barrier between him and his athletes.’There is certainly a math sort of profile to what you do in swimming that’s the same in any language,’ Walker said.Like many international students, Isiksalan came to the United States from Europe not only to work on swimming, but also to obtain an American education. For a model of that, he needs only to look across the pool to his teammate senior Luk Boral. After coming to SU from Poland, Boral is on track to complete both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in four years.Boral has also sets the standard for success in the pool. He is more accomplished than any other SU swimmer in the last four years, including breaking varsity records, winning Big East titles and placing at the NCAA championships. Freshman Alex Taraskin, from Moscow, Russia, also seems to be following Boral’s lead. He has more wins this year than any swimmer on the team and has qualified for the Big East Championship meet in four events.For Walker, the success of his international kids in both the pool and the classroom is to be expected.Said Walker: ‘You’re dealing obviously with some exceptional kids.’