The recent administration has enacted despicable policies regarding deportations of international students if they cannot attend in-person classes. Harvard and MIT recently have filed a lawsuit to battle these new policies, and peer institutions like Northwestern, Cornell, Princeton, UPenn and others have signed an amicus brief for this lawsuit. What has UChicago done? Only sent a vague and noncommittal email about ‘we will continue to fully support our students’.
Won’t you stand on your principles you insist you have by taking actions to battle the policies themselves? Many of us are frustrated by the responses of the UChicago administration, as it is obvious they are only adapting to the insane and shortsighted policies instead of fighting against the policies themselves. They can’t even call out the policies for what they are: xenophobic, hateful, anti-intellectual, and racist. Other universities are advocating for their students by filing legal challenges, lobbying, publicly renouncing these policies. The University of Chicago is just tacitly accepting them. I feel ashamed that the University I love is being run by an administration rife with cowardice.
They certainly are not doing enough! A first step to reassure their own students would be to guarantee all international students receive their first choice for in-person classes (i.e. by giving them first priority during pre-registration). In the long-term, UChicago should also be filing legal challenges against the regulations, like Harvard and MIT. I really hope UChicago gets off of their feet and takes action because to just tacitly comply is tantamount to alignment with hate.
It doesn’t matter that these are not ‘new regulations’. The way that they are currently being carried out in light of a global pandemic reeks of xenophobia and partisanship. That is why our peer institutions are banding together to launch a legal challenge against these policies. People in academia across the US are concerned and enraged. Why should we tacitly accept what is going on simply because these might not be ‘new regulations?’ The current pandemic is, at the very least, an extenuating circumstance. Is the excuse we are going to fall back on ‘well, you should have read the small text before getting your visa, and you deserve what you get?’
Even if the University of Chicago thinks they are doing a good enough job, they haven’t told the rest of the student population what they are actually doing/planning. That is why tons of students are feeling like they are being abandoned. What they are seeing is that the University can accept the dollars of international students when times are good and leave them in the lurch when political tides turn.
It’s not even certain how many faculty members are even willing to teach in-person classes. University of Chicago isn’t forcing its faculty to teach in person, so they need to figure out a better way to help these students other than just crossing their fingers and hoping that there are enough in-person classes for everyone.
As an aside, from a legal perspective, amicus briefs are nearly worthless as they usually just parrot what the plaintiffs already say. (In fact, some/many federal judges will not accept them for that reason.) Thus, Northwestern jumping on the Boston court bandwagon is just virtue signaling. (OTOH, it looks good on the CV of the law students who draft the friend of the court brief.)
Much better would be for Northwestern to join Chicago (and Michigan?) to file their own case in a Chicago District Court. If they could get a ‘local’ federal judge to give them a TRO, they are good-to-go for fall. (Doesn’t mean the TRO will not over turned by say spring, however, sending Internationals back home.)
Give them more than a few days to figure it out. They have numerous options and they just need to sort thru them.
This is correct on both points. The current decision of ICE NOT to extend the online waiver further really impacts those universities that have opted not to fulfill their educational mission via in-person instruction this fall. That’s really between them and the current administration. It’s not really UChicago’s problem.
However, - and not sure whether this has been mentioned upthread - UC filed an amicus brief on the lawsuit just today.
One has to wonder if Harvard has the ulterior motive of making sure that they don’t lose a significant amount of international students this year. That will definitively put pressure on their operational budget to lose another 5-10% for those international students who would just opt out this year if they can’t come to Cambridge.
^ it’s even worse than that. If you are an athlete and are opting out of the athletic program for any reason this year - say, redshirting or taking care of an injury - Harvard wants you to take a year off from the college as well. This year would be an opportune time to take a year off to develop skill or care for a nagging injury.
Very glad to hear that. All universities desperately need the revenue brought in from full pay international students. Not to mention the diversities from the presence of international students.
Not sure this decision changes anything for first-time students, however. If someone opts for online learning or is attending a school that is only offering online format for the time being, that might further complicate efforts to get a visa.
Interesting, I wonder why they didn’t live withing the budget that Congress gave them at the beginning of the year? Is there some budget money tied to the number of arrivals that I am unaware of?