Staff Reporter:The Trump administration is moving to expel foreign students from the United States this fall if their colleges or universities opt for online learning only as the coronavirus pandemic continues.
“Students attending schools operating entirely online may not take a full online course load and remain in the United States,” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced in a press release.
The eagerly awaited policy update issued Monday by ICE’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program applies to students with F-1 or M-1 visas — which are for academic and vocational international students, respectively. ICE suspended its student visa regulations this spring and summer, temporarily allowing international students to take more online classes as the pandemic shuttered colleges across the country.
The updated guidance comes as schools across the country consider how to reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic and it was announced the same day that Harvard University unveiled its plan to conduct all classes online this fall.
Harvard will allow first-year students and some others on campus, up to 40% of the total undergraduate population. Other schools have laid out a range of possibilities for fall instructions from telling students to stay home and attend classes remotely, to a hybrid approach where students should expect to take at least some classes in person.
Harvard President Larry Bacow in a statement said this new guidance “undermines” the well-being of students and faculty saying it, “imposes a blunt, one-size-fits-all approach to a complex problem, giving international students … few options beyond leaving the country or transferring schools.”
More than 1.1 million foreign students hold active student visas — including nearly 40,000 in Boston alone, federal data shows. The order is expected to have far-reaching implications for both students and higher education institutions across the country.
UMass Executive Director of Communications John Hoey condemned the move in an email to the Herald saying the ruling “will be extremely disruptive for international students and the colleges and universities they attend across the country.”
Hoey said university lawyers are “still assessing” whether its nearly 11,000 international students across its five campuses will be affected. UMass plans to roll out a hybrid teaching model this fall.
“The public health emergency that resulted in the waiver of these rules for the spring and summer semesters continues. Therefore, it remains imperative that we retain the flexibility to safely educate all of our students,” Hoey said.
Professor Abu Jalal, who chairs the finance department at Suffolk University, said this is another “big, big hit” to the bottom line for colleges and universities that were already facing budget crises amid rising expenses and falling revenues.
It also threatens revenue from tuition because international students will likely postpone college rather than miss out on the American campus experience, Jalal said.
“This is going to be a big nightmare in terms of planning courses,” Jalal added, noting schools will scramble to come up with costly hybrid teaching models that allow for both remote and in-person learning.- Boston Herald
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