Presented are background and academic performance data for one cohort of foreign undergraduates who entered the University of Washington (UW) as new students, those 336 entrants in fall 1978. Initially, the total group was subdivided on the basis of whether English was the "mother tongue" of the student's home country (26 percent came from English-speaking countries). The English- and non-English-speaking language groups were then compared and contrasted on selected pre-entry variables (such as, proportions from high school, two-year colleges, and four-year colleges). Next, employing five of these background variables as the breakout variable, first-year UW performance was profiled by comparing actual and predicted mean GPAs for levels within each breakout. Three highlights emerged. First, as would be expected, pre-college verbal performance was associated with first-year UW GPA for both language groups. In addition, for most comparisons the English-speaking group generally achieved higher mean GPAs than the corresponding non-English-speaking group. Second, regardless of language group, students who entered the University directly from a school outside the United States achieved mean first-year GPAs which were substantially higher than predicted. Lastly, when residence category was considered as the breakout, one "superior" group (F-1 visa students from English-speaking countries) and one "low" performing group appeared (nonimmigrants with other than an F-1 visa, all of whom were in the non-English-speaking language group). (Author)