Xiaofeng Wan, former admissions officer at Amherst College, is now working as a private consultant for international students who wish to come to the United States. This week, when he was holding meetings in China with potential students, he felt a deep uncertainty among their parents.
“They really do not know if they should send their children to a country where they do not welcome Chinese students or they see China as a hostile competitor,” said Wan by phone from Beijing. “It is an unprecedented situation that we have never seen before.”
For years, American colleges and universities have attracted an increasing number of international students who often pay full tuition fees, effectively subsidizing domestic students.
But the recent decision of the Trump administration to deport hundreds of students here on visas, and its trade war with China, have delighted fears that the United States was no longer a welcoming place for international students. This week, the administration also asked Harvard University to put lists of foreign students, adding to a feeling of panic on campus.
Suzanne Ortega, president of the Council of Higher Schools, said that the chaos of visa endings had fueled the concerns among many students. “I think it sends a powerful signal to friends and family at home that the United States is no longer a safe place,” she said.
If the nation acquires a reputation to be hostile to international students, it could be devastating for many American colleges and universities.
In the United States, more than 1.1 million international students during the 2023-24 academic year, according to a recent report published by the Educational and Cultural Affairs Bureau of the State Department and the Institute of International Education. The number includes students who remain briefly in the country after graduation to acquire work experience.
The report identifies the University of New York, the Northeast University and Columbia University as the three largest reception schools for international students. In Nyu, their registration has increased by almost 250% in the last decade.
Losing foreign students could also be bad for the wider economy, according to experts. International students pumped nearly $ 44 billion in the American economy and generated 378,000 jobs last year, according to NAFSA: Association of International Educators, which promotes international education.
Moody’s, the bond rating agency, downgraded the prospects for higher education to “negative” last month, citing changes in federal policy as a threat.
The Trump administration said it was targeting international students who have violated the law or formed a threat to its interests in foreign policy.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio argued that “no one has the right to a visa”. In remarks last month, he said that by giving and revoking visas, “we are going to be mistaken.”
“We are not going to import activists in the United States,” he added. “They are there to study. They are there to go to class. They are not there to direct militant movements which are disruptive and undermine the – our universities. I think it’s madness to continue to allow this. ”
International students registrations have been on an ascending trajectory for decades. Gaurav Khanna, an economist at the University of California in San Diego, who studied foreign students, said the income they brought in certain public universities to the great recession.
Khanna’s research has revealed that schools that could attract students from abroad was often able to avoid raising tuition fees in students and significant research and educational cuts.
“To keep the doors open to local students, you have to leave more international students,” he said.
Beyond the economic effects, the leaders of higher education fear that the decrease in international inscriptions will dissuade the best minds in the world to come in the United States. International students have represented nearly 6% of the total higher education population in the United States, according to the IIE report.
At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where more than 1 in 4 students from abroad, the president, Sally Kornbluth, said on Monday that the university would be “seriously diminished without the students and academics who join other nations”.
“The threat of revocations of unexpected visas will make it less likely that the best talents around the world will come to the United States,” Kornbluth said in a message to the campus. “This will harm American competitiveness and scientific leadership for the years to come.”
Chris R. Glass, professor at the Boston College who studies international registrations, estimates that 50,000 to 75,000 international graduate students in the fields of science and technology could be affected by federal subsidy reductions.
Overall, he said that the number of international students could fall below one million for the first time since the 2014-2015 academic year.
An analysis of the New York Times revealed that the Trump administration had canceled more than 1,500 visas in 222 schools in the country. Immigration agents also sought to hold and expel a number of students and researchers.
Some of the visa revocations seem to be linked to legal offenses in the past of students, some are linked to activism, and in some cases, students do not know why they have lost their visas.
An international student in London, Patrick, who was 22, described a huge fear among his comrades. He asked that neither his last name nor his New York University be identified for fear of the repercussions.
He said he had recently deleted all of his text messages because he was worried about surveillance when he returned to the country. However, he said, he plans to finish his last year in the United States and stay a year after graduation.
President Donald Trump’s first term has also brought a cold registration for international students. In 2017, Trump prohibited travel from seven countries with a predominantly Muslim, and many colleges reported drops from foreign candidates. A greater decline occurred during the COVVI-19 pandemic.
“Some universities can probably resist the storm. But other universities do not have the resources,” Khanna said. “If they are cut off from their funding and at the same time have the income of international students cut, they are in trouble.”
Many students arriving from the outside of the United States consider their diplomas as ways to employment in the country.
But as the Trump administration seeks to repress immigration, some students could be dissuaded on anxiety that study in the United States and membership of the domestic working population “no longer guarantee the things you think it was,” said Khanna.
It was already a particularly perilous period for American schools, which face a drop in students as birth rates plunge.
Recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics predicts that the annual number of graduated high school elderly, which this year culminated at more than 3.8 million, will decrease at 3.5 million by 2032.
During Trump’s first term, some American universities tried to persuade foreign students to present themselves despite the concerns concerning a hostile administration.
Now universities rush to help the already registered international students who have been forced to leave.
After the State Department has canceled the visas of 40 students and recent graduates of the Northeastern University in Boston, the school said that it would offer some of these students of distance learning opportunities or transfers to its international campuses.
Khanna said it was not clear what could happen in the long term, this time. “Is there a question of” will the United States lose this comparative advantage? “”
This article originally appeared in the New York Times.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
