Wichita ? A sharp drop in oil prices could mean fewer students from Saudi Arabia will be attending Wichita State University, which would mean a loss of millions of dollars in revenue, university officials said.

About 260 of the 319 Saudi Arabian students who attend Wichita State are supported by Saudi government-supported scholarships. But that government has drastically reduced its scholarships for overseas students in response to the decline in oil prices, The Wichita Eagle reported. Provost Tony Vizzini said if the school lost those students and couldn’t replace them, it would cost the university about $4 million in annual revenue.

Vince Altum, Wichita State’s executive director of international education, said the Saudi government has decided the King Abdullah Scholarship Program, which supplies the scholarships, is going to provide them only to students who attend one of the top 100 in an academic listing of American schools. Wichita State is not on that list, although only about 10 percent of the nearly 90,000 Saudi students in the U.S. are enrolled at a top 100 university, according to the Institute of International Education.

Losing the Saudi students “would be a bad thing for the university,” Vizzini said, because the Saudis, “do a lot for our community. They are great students. They bring their culture here.”

They also help the economy because the students in Wichita live with about 200 family members.

University officials believe many of the students would stay at Wichita State, even if they have to pay their own way, Vizzini said.

Mustafa Albusaeed, a Saudi Arabian who will graduate with a mechanical engineering degree in May, agreed with Vizzini.

“I like it here a lot,” said Albusaeed. “It has been wonderful. I met my wife here (Zahra, a fellow Saudi and a senior studying finance). I have many friends. The students, the staff are all friendly. It’s safe here, compared with other cities. WSU is cheaper than other good schools. And the engineering school is very good.”

Wichita State’s engineering school has a good reputation, and competition in Saudi Arabia to get into those top 100 schools will be strong, so he thinks many students will still pay to study in Wichita.

Meanwhile, Wichita State will continue to send recruiters to other countries and will target countries that might make up for the potential loss of Saudis, Vizzini said, noting many developing countries such as Nepal need engineers.

Altum has sent recruiters to Nepal four times in recent months, which has generated at least 225 applications to Wichita State. Although that doesn’t mean all of them will enroll, the work in that country is encouraging, he said. Wichita State also has sent recruiters to Brazil, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Paraguay.