ICE Say International students MUST take in-class In the fall :(

https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/6/21315168/ice-immigration-international-students-universities-deportation

This is a disaster if this is true and they hold to it! This is why the waitlist is still open in most schools

It’s a time of great disruption for everyone. Work the problem to come up with alternatives as the situation remains fluid.

International students can’t “work the problem”. If this is true, they have to take a gap year because if their college goes online, they’ll be deported, which means they won’t be allowed to return to the US to complete their studies (this is the consequence of being deported).
Harvard is going to be entirely online: woosh, all international students admitted to Harvard are now on an automatic gap year.
For colleges that plan to go online for part of the semester, that’s also a big problem since it may mean their international students won’t be able to attend.

@MYOS1634 well as of right now Penn State is all Zoom until mid July when they will announce how the in-class will work and the Michigan Stater has a mix. Deporting means to me your going to lose your visa too

this is the craziest college year ever…so many students left scrambling, no one is looking forward to the “new normal” of campus life, so many taking gap year …and now this mess with internationals. I would hate to be in admissions and upper college management.

Being deported means you’re no longer eligible for a visa and can’t return to the US, even to visit, for 10 years. As a result, any student in that situation wouldn’t be able to complete their degree.
So, internationals need to know right now if their college will be fully online because it generally takes 4-6 weeks even without the embassy closures.

I would check the veracity of this article. Doesn’t cite anyone by name at ICE or have enough details for me to believe it.

Wow, it appears to have veracity per the ICE site.

If you leave voluntarily doesn’t that preserve your ability to reapply for a visa?

My heart goes out to International students this year. In trying to understand the announcement today, would International students be allowed to continue with the online classes from their home country at least? I understand it will be difficult with time differences but hopefully the universities will accommodate by allowing recorded lectures to make it easier.

“deportation” means you don’t leave voluntarily. ‘voluntarily leave’ is also called “gap year”.

ICE has a long-standing policy of not giving student visas to students enrolled in a fully online program. Both domestic and international students have been completing degrees at US colleges and universities from outside the US for years. I completed my MS Ed. TESOL in a fully online program. Many of my classmates were working outside the US. Quite a few of those were international students. When they came to the US to present their final projects and to attend graduation, they came with tourist visas.

What is new, is requiring that students who are physically in the US now, and whose programs have moved online in response to an emergency situation, must either leave the country or transfer to a place that does have in-person classes. Many international students who were here earlier in the year left for their home countries either when their college/university moved online, or when their courses ended this spring. Many consulates aren’t open and so aren’t issuing new student visas right now. This means that the number so students who are specifically affected by the new interpretation of the policy are relatively few in number.

If your college/university is online, you can continue your studies outside the US provided you have access to decent internet service. So this isn’t automatically a problem for everyone. You aren’t necessarily forced into a gap year. I have a student right now who went home two weeks ago, and after clearing quarantine in her home country at a hotel with bad wi-fi, is now attending classes daily.

Those students who are trapped in the US because of financial issues and/or travel restrictions, and/or for whom there would be no decent wi-fi in their possible not-USA locations, the first step right now is to contact their own college/university here. Find out what your college/university can arrange for students in your situation. They may be able to accommodate you. If they can’t, they should be able to help you identify another institution where you could arrange a guest semester or even a transfer.

How is it a gap year if you take classes online from your home country? For example, all Harvard students will be taking their classes online…some on campus and some from their homes.

Please be aware that attending school online from your home country has implications for your OPT eligibility.

If you were hoping to use OPT next summer to work in the US (for an internship during summer break or for your first job after graduation), please reach out to your university’s international student adviser before opting to do the fall semester online.