Imagine you have already been paying twice as much tuition as some students, and suddenly you find out you will pay two or even three times more next quarter.The increase in tuition is what some international students from Asian countries are experiencing. These countries are facing currency crises since Thailand’s currency dropped in July.Indonesian students, who are affected the most in terms of exchange rate, are standing up to try to make a difference for suffering fellow students at Ohio State.The Indonesian Students Association is organizing a petition to ask the university to reduce the amount of tuition for affected Asian students temporarily.Undergraduate international students are paying out-of-state tuition, which is $10,896 per year and international graduate students are paying $13,500 each academic year.The group collected about 100 signatures in four days, said Deddy Priyanto, a senior majoring in industrial engineering. He is president of the association, which has more than 300 members in Columbus colleges.Since Priyanto came to the United States in July 1993, Indonesian rupiah has depreciated four times. It has gone from about 2,500 rupiah to the dollar to almost 10,000 rupiah to the dollar.Priyanto wishes the university will agree to lower the tuition for affected students as much as possible.”Even if they reduce it by 50 percent, [tuition] still costs us,” he said. The reduction is coming from a 400 percent increase in the exchange rate between the rupiah and the dollar.One of the students who signed the petition, Vivi Susanti, said she has to think twice when she wants to buy something. She said she always remembers to calculate not only the price in rupiah but to also multiply it four times.The crisis has even caused some to take time off school.”I have a friend who is taking a quarter off and working on campus,” said Susanti, a senior majoring in marketing and human resources. Even if the petition does not succeed in getting tuition lowered for affected students, Susanti thinks the movement will create an opportunity for international students to voice their serious situations to the OSU community, she said.”I think a lot of people don’t realize how [the currency crisis] is affecting students from Asian countries,” Susanti said.Priyanto encourages other student organizations who represent students from affected countries to organize their own petitions. He also said the association will accept signatures from whomever sympathize with their situation.”We are trying to get as much help as possible, so we won’t reject whoever comes to us,” he said.