Lipscomb students were turned away at Scotland’s border during spring break when they tried to enter the country for their mission trip.
The team was denied access by Scottish customs officials when they arrived on Sunday, March 13, to start their work with Westmaines Church of Christ. The situation is currently under investigation.
Katie Dillard, senior in studio art, was one of the team’s student leaders. She said it is still somewhat unclear why the group was detained, but she said she thinks they were targeted by the officials.
“We’re all white Anglo-Saxons,” Dillard said. “But none of us look at all suspicious. I guess the moment we showed up on the UK border, I felt like we were profiled as Americans.”
Dillard, who is from the Washington D.C. area, has travelled internationally before and said that she worked hard to prepare her team for the trip. But things started to go wrong, she said, when one of the customs officials began questioning a student.
“She was asking very intruding questions,” Dillard said. “He was not expecting her to interrogate him like that.”
“Everything started snowballing downhill from there.”
One team member, Emily Millstead, a freshman social work major, was cleared to enter the country but was sent back when the officials decided to detain the whole group.
Millstead, who is originally from Grand Blanc, Mich., said she has traveled internationally before but felt nervous in Scotland.
“That’s the most intimidating customs I’ve ever been through,” Millstead said. “It was kind of intense.”
Millstead said she was putting away her passport when she heard some commotion and realized there was a problem.
“I have two choices,” Millstead said, explaining her thoughts at the time. “I either go ahead and try to get my luggage, or I stay back with the group.”
Millstead said that while she was hesitating about what to do, one of the officials began questioning her and then made her go back with the group. She said she kept thinking, “I’m the one who made it through. They think I’m a big liar.”
The students had said they were “visiting friends and touring the country.” Dillard said this was true because they had already met the Scottish minister they would be working with and they intended to do some shopping or traveling each day.
According to both Dillard and Millstead, the officials were convinced that the students were lying about their intentions in the country.
“Everyone kept their cool, but we were getting a little ticked because they weren’t listening to us,” Dillard said. “We did show that we were professional and Christians, and I do hope that affected them.”
Millstead said she was afraid initially but later tried to lighten the mood a little. “I tried to joke about it and play it off,” she said.
“The common emotion was shock and disappointment,” Dillard said.
According to Millstead, after more than 4 hours waiting in the airport, the group was told they had not been admitted because they lied to the officials.
The team member’s passports were flagged, which could cause problems if they try to travel in the future.
“It’s humiliating that you’ve been denied access for a reason you don’t fully understand,” Dillard said, adding that Lipscomb lawyers are trying to clear the students’ records.
The next day the team was on a return flight. Two team members joined a Lipscomb mission group in New York, but the rest of the students went home.
“It’s good to be somewhere familiar and safe after going through something like that,” Dillard said.
Dillard said she hopes that Lipscomb will continue the trip even though her group had trouble this time.
“This is something I would really encourage Lipscomb not to get rid of just because of this one instance,” Dillard said. “It would be a huge waste.”
Dillard said that, even though she was disappointed by what happened, the trip provided an opportunity to consider the struggles of long-term missionaries.
“This is what real missionaries face,” Dillard said. “We’ve gotten a taste of that and can mature from that.”
“The team was very good about this. They were very responsible about keeping that Christian attitude. I was really proud of them, even though we were tremendously disappointed.”