Washington — International education and study abroad remain challenges for historically black college and universities, according to studies presented today at the annual conference here of Nafsa: Association of International Educators.

One study, a survey of 53 black colleges, found that they sent a total of 844 students abroad in the 2003-4 academic year. The study, conducted by the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education, also found that only a quarter of the institutions surveyed employed a full-time study-abroad coordinator.

Lanitra Berger, senior manager of research and policy at the association, said that often the colleges employ only part-time staff members in international education or have professors pull double-duty. Mr. Berger said it was important for black-college presidents to commit to international education. The colleges need full-time coordinators, she said, “so that the students we send abroad look like the diversity we have in the United States.”

Jacqueline Howard-Matthews, of the United Negro College Fund Special Programs Corporation, said the barriers to international education at black colleges were greater than the challenges of staffing study-abroad offices.

Ms. Howard-Matthews, who presented the results of another survey of 1,346 students at black colleges, said that the students are often more concerned about increasing international-studies resources than study-abroad opportunities. She said that too many study-abroad programs at black colleges were “pass-throughs,” in which students are applauded for travel but fail to integrate overseas experiences into the curricula at the home institution. Development of study abroad must accompany improved foreign-language and area studies, she said. —Ingrid Norton