ICE to deport international students at colleges and universities that have gone online for COVID

ICE announced today that no international students can get visas to attend US universities and take online courses there; an international student must take all classes online except one. International students who are here already and whose colleges have gone online, or whose next classes are online, must leave, or they are eligible for deportation.

International students who start their classes online at their college while waiting for a visa to US, because US embassies are closed in their countries or because US embassies have backlogs, are not eligible for visas to come to the US to continue their education at that college.

Colleges that depend on international students and their full-pay tuition are in a world of hurt. STEM graduate programs are also in a world of hurt.

Could someone knowledgeable please give a clear explanation of all the foreseeable repercussions, short term and long term.

This is just horrible. I guess I should be unsurprised with the isolationist tendencies of the current administration. I feel so sorry for the kids and the colleges. My daughter will be online this fall as the country her university is located in (China) is not allowing any foreigners to enter. While I could see them beginning to allow visas from countries where COVID-19 is fairly contained, I doubt they will be allowing anyone in from the US (and who can blame them since the virus is out of control). We are just assuming she’ll be online this entire year and hoping a change in our executive branch may lead to more leadership in getting the virus under control.

As to ICE, if their plan is to pressure colleges/universities to open up with f2f classes when it is unsafe, that is dangerous. If students cannot take online classes as it would risk their visa, I certainly hope colleges and universities will allow for deferrals/gap semesters or years to prevent that issue. So terrible for the students though.

All of Harvard’s classes will be online this coming year. This means that no international Harvard students can remain in the U.S.

STEM graduate programs usually involve in person benchwork. When I did my grad work in STEM, time in the research lab counted as a course. If labs are still open, international students are OK. If labs close, as they did in the spring, international grad students are in trouble.

This is going to really hurt US higher education in the long run. International students will go to other countries instead of the US. As a previous poster said, US institutions will lose their full pay international students.

This is IMPORTANT
Students at schools offering a hybrid of in-person and online learning will be permitted to take some online courses and remain in the country, though the school must certify “that the student is not taking an entirely online course load this semester.”

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced Monday that international students “may not take a full online course load and remain in the United States” during the fall 2020 semester

International students on nonimmigrant F-1 and M-1 visas cannot remain in the U.S. or legally enter the U.S. if their studies are entirely online, and ICE recommended in a press release that students whose schools are online-only should “[transfer] to a school with in-person instruction to remain in lawful status.”

If a student lives abroad and is completely online they can still take classes. The ones really hurt are those already living in the US. Don’t understand the rationale in making them leave.

Given our Covid status many foreign students may elect to go elsewhere in any event. And American students studying in the EU may not be able to return to their schools because of the current ban on Americans entering those countries.

*If a student lives abroad and is completely online they can still take classes. *

But according to these guidelines, would then not get the chance to convert to taking face to face classes with a visa later on. If, post-Covid, the university drops online for classes essential for that student’s major, and these regulations continue, they cannot finish their degree.

Why can’t they apply for a visa once the school class format goes to face to face ?

Nonimmigrant F-1 and M-1 students attending schools operating entirely online may not take a full online course load and remain in the United States. The U.S. Department of State will not issue visas to students enrolled in schools and/or programs that are fully online for the fall semester nor will U.S. Customs and Border Protection permit these students to enter the United States.

This only applies to the 2020 fall semester.

I am not clear… is this a NEW rule, or an old one (designed to prevent people from getting a workaround visa for the price of a class at the University of Phoenix or something) with unforseen consequences?

Colleges who are going completely online can get around this by allowing their international students to take one class each semester in-person at a nearby college or university (maybe even facilitate transportation) OR by opening up a single lab class at their own school. For sure this messes things up, but there would appear to be fairly simple work-arounds for colleges interested in holding on to their international students.

It’s a modification of an existing rule. If you’re a foreign student you have to take in person classes to study in the US. No online classes. They modified that for spring and summer 2020 to allow online classes when the schools closed. Now they’re modifying it again.

This is absolutely horrible. Colleges are going to scramble to offer some sort of 1-credit f2f class so that their international students can attend but most won’t be able to handle this new blow.
Deportation has long-term consequences for internationals so they wouldn’t risk it.
What about international TA’s that many large universities depend on?
Colleges and universities were already in a world of pain, where many, many universities may not survive, and the US as the #1 higher education country&research powerhouse would suffer.

Now this.
Do we know whether it’s coordinated/on purpose (as expressed in Administration communication, two birds one stone) or just targeting international students (and kind of accidentlly hitting universities too?)
Keep in mind that internationals choosing the US to study was already decreasing, with Canada and Australia rising (especially since they’re considered safe compared to the US during the pandemic).

I wonder if colleges will find clever or creative ways of getting around this. What does “online” or “in person” mean, anyway? You could have international students housed on campus in dorms interacting with their professors from computer screens in their dorm rooms. Does that count as “online” or “in person” ? What if you have the class in the university’s stadium or arena or theater or gym, everyone keeping social distancing while the prof lectures from a stage in center field, with TV screens, etc?

Maybe, they could offer classes like Outdoor Photography, Underwater Basket Weaving, Intro to American Pop Culture that are all ostensibly “in person”? How long does that class have to be? How long does the professor need to be there? What if the class in NOT online, but NOT in-person either?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB1X4o-MV6o

I can foresee wrangling over definitions, technicalities and all sorts of minutiae.

Would be very tough for colleges to get around these rules as housing will be an issue. Also foreign parents are just like us, if things get too crazy and the value isn’t there, they will make decisions based on what’s best for their kids.
The US demand for college is huge so I don’t think it will have long term impact but I do think it could be a rough year or two.
Will also force the issue of using international students as the full pay mainstay for some of these schools.

If I understand correctly, many state universities depend on the tuition from international students. It’s an important part of the budget. State and federal government aren’t going to fill that gap. These tuitions are important because we have been unwilling to fund our public universities ourselves. If taxpayers weren’t filling to fund them pre-pandemic, is it even possible to raise taxes or reappropriate revenue to fund them now? I don’t see how. What exactly is the goal of this policy?

I don’t see how the result isn’t widespread closure of public (and private) colleges and universities in the very near future.

Then I wonder, how many care? I honestly don’t know.

I don’t think many people saw this policy coming.

We may see many international students transfer to EU or UK schools now. Rising juniors and seniors are in the most precarious situation.

Although these students could live at home and take all of their US based classes online, the time difference can be really challenging.

Perhaps if the students knew this would only be a one year situation they would try online classes from home, but if this goes on for multiple years, it might not make sense for many international students to pay full price for an online degree from a US college.

I also expect we will see legal challenges to these rules filed ASAP.

Harvard has done a quick turnaround as a result of this new development. They’ll now let up to 40% of its undergrads on campus in the fall. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/07/harvard-to-bring-up-to-40-of-undergrads-to-campus-this-fall/

Harvard is allowing kids on campus but classes are all online. Doesn’t help the international students.

Also depends if classes are asynchronous or via zoom/video conferencing … the latter will be challenging for a portion of the at home students so I wonder if most of the lectures will simply be taped for viewing on demand.

The full pay international students will have other options.

US colleges and universities don’t have other options to make up that revenue.

@bouders I believe that H is just going to have students live on campus but take classes online. International students would not be able to do this.

If I were president of a college that had online classes this fall, I’d create a 1-credit physical education course that meets one evening a week on the quad (masks and 6 feet apart of course!) and everyone does 50 minutes of yoga or jumping jacks or who the hell cares.

If I were a student at said college I’d encourage my peers to wear creative t-shirts to this course! I would offer examples but I’m sure my post would be taken down!

I’m so freakin’ sick of our xenophobic, cruel immigration policies.