Wanted: college students with impeccable pasts. Speakers of non-Romance languages preferred. Sunglasses and trench coats optional. Great salary. Apply (hush-hush) to the CIA. 

     Faced with budget cuts, flare-ups in previously obscure nations and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the CIA is cozying up to college students. 

     It seems that the spy agency - whose motto is: "Our business is knowing the world's business" - finds itself scrambling to cover the continents with a shrinking staff. 

     President Clinton's budget plan calls for trimming the CIA's $28 billion budget by $7 billion over the next five years. 

     To compensate, one money-saving idea being considered would use college students as a reserve force to analyze information during international emergencies. 

     But CIA officials sidestep details of the proposal. 

     "We are exploring to what extent people with expertise in languages or computers can help us from time to time," says CIA spokesman Peter Earnest. "But I stress that this is a concept, an idea by no means worked out." 

     He cites one major hitch in depending on students. 

     "What if there is a sudden need for them and it is during final exams week? We have a lot of problems to work out," says Earnest. 

     Still, the federal agency is scouring college campuses in search of very specific-skilled students. The student with a general education background is no longer in demand, say CIA recruiters. The agency today seeks students majoring in economics, computer science, engineering and foreign languages native to world hot spots like Bosnia and Somalia. 

     Of particular interest to the CIA are students enrolled in the new foreign translation center and Florida A&M University's campus in Tallahassee. 

    The historically black public college received a $1.74 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense last October to teach African and Asian languages. 

     FAMU president Frederick Humphries confirmed that the CIA is showing up more frequently on his campus doorstep. 

     "We have had some students intern with the CIA and we are expanding that," says Humphries. "We will be doing activities with them that are appropriate for a university but we won't be involved in any secretive or clandestine activity of the CIA." 

     FAMU graduate Daryl Parks, now a law student at Florida State University, worked two summers at the CIA's headquarters in Langley, Va. 

     "I was an imagery analyst," says Parks. "We looked at different pictures from satellites of different countries and their tactical vehicle units." 

     Parks began to explain his job in greater detail, but suddenly paused in mid-sentence. 

     "Aaaa … wait a minute. I’m not supposed to tell you what countries they were." 

     Kim O'Shea, a CIA recruiter for Florida, says students do not work as spies but are instructed not to discuss details of their jobs. 

     "They are cautioned because the work they do may be classified," she says. 

     CIA officials estimate thousands if students apply for CIA internships and co-operative education programs each year. About 300 are chosen. 

     Internships are usually one-time employment during the summer. Students on co-ops are often called back year after year. Many of them end up taking fulltime jobs with the agency upon graduation. 

     The application process is rigorous, often taking six to nine months. The CIA thoroughly checks out the student's academic and personal backgrounds. There are polygraph tests, fingerprinting and intensive interview sessions. Yes, agents do talk to your neighbors and classmates. 

     "I didn't feel offended by it, but they were very thorough," says Parks. "I enjoyed working at the CIA. It was a great internship." 

     Among the perks: free transportation, a housing subsidy, a chance at overtime pay and, for co-op students, health benefits while on the job. 

     "We find we sometimes have to dispel the James Bond myth," says George Reines, chief of the CIA recruiting office in Atlanta. "We're not using students to help with a national crisis or send them overseas. Everything is above-board." 

     Juliette McDonald, associate director of internships at Florida State University in Tallahassee, finds herself frequently dispelling CIA myths with students.  "Some students seem to have misconceptions that everyone at the CIA must be a special agent," says McDonald. 

     Although CIA recruiters work hard to dispel the agency's shadowy spy image, CIA ads in college newspapers seem to embellish that perception. 

     Take the quarter-page ad that appeared recently in the University of Miami's Hurricane newspaper: "Collecting information on trends and current events abroad isn't just a job for a secret agent. You don't have to be an aspiring missile warhead specialist or Kremlinologist. Join one of the country's largest information networks -- because an experience like this doesn't only happen in the movies." 

     "It's a marketing gimmick to get the student's attention," says Cynthia Swol, in charge of co-ops at the University of Miami. "But, seriously, I encourage students to look to the CIA for co-ops and internships. The pay is good, and it could lead to great careers." 

     It turned out to be a 24-year career for Fred Rustmann, who retired in 1990. The former undercover CIA agent now heads CTC International Group -- a West Palm Beach firm that provides intelligence services for private companies with foreign operations. 

     Rustmann says 90 percent of the CIA work is unclassified and students could help in a budget-cutting pinch. However, he doesn't foresee a reserve force of student spies to help in hot spots of the world. 

     "Students may see the faces of [undercover] officers, but they don't have access to classified information," says Rustmann. "We need intelligence agents to know what's going on in the world so we can head things off before problems occur. There is no longer a Soviet threat of nuclear holocaust, but the world is still a rough neighborhood."