Trump to International Students: "Get Lost!"

July 10, 2020

You're got smarts, ambition, a great future. As an international student in the U.S., you're paying full price (or more) for your schooling.

International students at Nottingham Trent University
in Britain, where they're still welcome.

But thanks to Donald Trump's new Immigration and Customs Enforcement directive, no amount of merit can keep you from deportation if you can't take classes on site at your campus. 

Doesn't matter if you've almost gotten your degree; doesn't matter if you're asthmatic and can't take the risk of catching COVID-19 in an on-campus classroom. You gotta do it or you're going home.

On the bright side, you're helping Trump get reelected, because his xenophobic voter base doesn't like you any more than Trump does. 
Based on March 1998 figures, the directive could affect some 1.2 million students at more than 8,700 U.S. schools, CNN says, citing a May 2018 report by the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington think tank.

According to a study cited in a National Public Radio article, international higher-education students contributed $41 billion and supported 458,290 jobs in their U.S. schools during the 2018-2019 academic year.

The students are stuck between a rock and a hardass. If their schools have already said they'll operate online only, the State Department will not issue them visas for the school year, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection will not allow them to enter the country. If you went home for the summer, tough luck.

ICE helpfully suggests that affected students can lower their course loads drastically (to one class or 3 credits) or transfer to another college with in-person instruction. The latter is cold comfort for Ph.D students writing dissertations or those in specialty programs, for example, at Harvard's Kennedy School. Or they can take a medical leave (bone spurs, anybody?).

At best, the policy severely undercuts one of the primary reasons the U.S. welcomes international students: To give them a positive view of the U.S. that they will take with them when they go home.

What do you think of the new rules? Do you see any positive consequences? What impact will the rules have on national security? Are international students a potential danger to the United States? What would you advise the affected students to do? Are you for or against helping students stay in the country)? Is there any way that non-academics can get involved -- on either side of the controversy? 

Note: The Trump Administration rescinded the order after considerable pushback from the public and from academia.

Photo credit:
"Trip to Newstead Abbey with International students" by Nottingham Trent University is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0


https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/07/06/888026874/ice-foreign-students-must-leave-the-u-s-if-their-colleges-go-online-only-this-fa