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Fewer New Foreign Students Coming to America
While more than 1 million internationals study in the U.S. for college and university, the rate at which they are arriving is slower, with a decline shown among new foreign students coming here.
The annual Open Doors report released Monday shows that the rapid rise of international students -- mostly from China and India -- over the past decade stalled in 2016-2017. Enrollment figures show about 10,000 fewer new students came to the U.S. this year over last.
This is the first time the number of new enrollments has declined in six years.
“The factors driving the decline are a mix of global and local economic conditions,” said Allan Goodman, president of the International Institute for Education (IIE), which compiles the data with the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, such as declines in students coming from Saudi Arabia and Brazil.
Because of cutbacks in overseas government programs that fund scholarship in the U.S., Saudi enrollment in U.S. schools declined 14 percent. Brazil showed a 32 percent decline in the amount of students it sends here.
The cost of college in the U.S. and increased competition from universities and programs in other nations has dampened the attractiveness of higher education in the U.S., IIE reported.
“What we’re hearing for the first time is ‘Ouch!’ from families,” Goodman said. “Our costs have risen to the point where our students are looking for alternatives.”
Schools in Germany, France, China and Japan, among others, are setting up programs taught in English, said Peggy Blumenthal, IIE’s chief counselor to Goodman. Some of those programs are far less expensive than tuition and fees in the U.S., she said.
“Countries and multinational employers around the world are competing to attract top talent. As more countries become active hosts of international students and implement national strategies to attract them, the competition … will only intensify,” Goodman said.
Other factors dissuading internationals from coming to America? Safety and security for their children, and the existing political climate, experts said.
Increasing conflicts on U.S. campuses gives parents and grandparents pause before sending their young family members to America, said Rajika Bhandari, head of research, police and practice at IIE.
Incidents have made global news about fatalities and hurt in college towns, such as in Charlottesville, Virginia, where white supremacists clashed with opponents near the University of Virginia. One women and two male law enforcement officers were killed this summer in protests.
In the Midwest, a Chinese student abducted at the University of Illinois is presumed dead. Most recently, a Chinese student was killed in a car-jacking near the University of Utah. Two Indian immigrants who came to the U.S. as international students, were shot in Kansas as they enjoyed a drink after work. One died, and the news was widely reported in India.
Those incidents have dove-tailed with President Donald Trump’s call for less immigration, specifically from Muslim-majority nations. Some students have expressed fear that their visas could be nullified, leaving them with incomplete degree programs in the U.S.
However, none of the 10 top countries that account for the overwhelming number of foreign enrollment are included in current visa restrictions.
China and India continue to send the most students: China sent 350,000 (nearly 7 percent increase), and India, 186,000 (more than 12 percent more than the previous year). Nepalese enrollment increased to more than 11,000 studying in the U.S. (20 percent upward shift); Vietnamese more than 22,400 (nearly 5 percent more than the past year).
Iranian enrollment increased to 12,600 students (3 percent increase) in U.S. schools, while Nigeria -- which sends the most African students to U.S. institutions -- had 11,700 students here, a nearly 10 percent increase.
Bangladesh sent more than 7,000 students to the U.S. in the past academic year, an increase of 9.7 percent.
Mexico is ninth in the list of countries that send students to the U.S., with nearly 17,000 in programs. That was a 0.6 percent increase over the past school year. Canada is No. 5, sending 27,000 students to the southern side of North America.
The No. 1 major for international students is engineering, business and management, math and computer science (which increased 18 percent), social sciences, physical and life sciences, fine and applied arts, health professions. Studies in Intensive English declined nearly 26 percent, with education declining more than 7 percent.
The number of international students in the U.S. are staying longer to participate in Optional Practical Training (OPT), a visa program that allows them to train in their field after their degree is complete.
IIE also conducts what they call a “snapshot” of trends for the current school year, 2017-2018. The nearly 500 colleges and universities say they see the same flattening in number of students and decline of about 7 percent in new students.
International students add about $39.4 billion to the U.S. economy through tuition, room and board and living expenses, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. Sixty percent of international students pay for their U.S. education through personal family funds.
The universities with the largest populations of international students are New York University, University of Southern California, Columbia University, Northeastern University, Arizona State University, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign, University of California-Los Angeles, Purdue University, University of Texas-Dallas, Pennsylvania State University.
The states where most international students attend programs are California, New York, Texas, Massachusetts, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Florida, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana.
The survey is conducted by IIE with the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO), American Association of Community Colleges (AACC), American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), American Council on Education (ACE), Association of Public and Land Grant Universities (APLU), College Board, Council on Graduate Schools (CGS), National Association for College Admissions Counseling (NACAC), and the Association of International Educators (NAFSA).
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US advisory council ends Nigeria visit, signs student exchange deal
Members of a U.S. presidential advisory council have approved a student exchange deal between an American college and a Nigerian university as part of the council's effort to strengthen collaboration on education, health, entrepreneurship and development between Africa and Africans living abroad.
The council also visited a health facility supported by the United States Agency for International Development in the capital.
Nigerian authorities and visitors chatted with members of the U.S President's Advisory Council on African Diaspora Engagement as they toured a healthcare facility in Karu, a suburb of Abuja, on the last day of the council's three-day visit to Abuja and Lagos.
The facility is one of many supported by the United States Agency for International Development, or USAID, to improve the management of childhood illnesses, family planning, immunization and delivery.
The tour was part of the council's effort to promote African diaspora-led investments in technology entrepreneurship, education and healthcare delivery.
"They're doing a phenomenal job there, it really gave us a sense of what the healthcare system is in Nigeria," said Deniece Laurent-Mantey, executive director of the advisory council. "This is our first trip as a council to the continent and we chose Nigeria for a reason — the diaspora in Nigeria is very active, very influential, and they're really a source of strength when it comes to our U.S.-Africa policy. And so for us coming to Nigeria was very intentional."
The council was created by President Joe Biden in September to improve collaboration between Africa and its diaspora in terms of economic and social development.
Akila Udoji, manager of the Primary Healthcare Centre of Karu, said officials in Nigeria were pleased that the council members were able to visit.
"We're happy that they have seen what the money they have given to us to work with has been used to do, because they have been able to assist us in capacity-building, trainings, equipment supply and the makeover of the facility," Udoji said.
Earlier, the council signed a deal for a student exchange program between Spelman College in the southern U.S. city of Atlanta and Nigeria's University of Lagos.
Laurent-Mantey said education exchanges are one of the council's top priorities.
"In Lagos, we had the president of Spelman College — she's also a member of our council — she signed an agreement with the University of Lagos to further education exchange programs in STEM and creative industries between those two universities," Laurent-Mantey said. "And I think for us it's very important, because Spelman College is a historically Black university, and so here we are promoting the importance of collaboration between African Americans and Africans."
In March, the advisory council adopted its first set of recommendations for the U.S. president, including the student exchange initiative, advocating for more U.S. government support for Africa, climate-focused initiatives, and improving U.S. visa access for Africans.
The council met with Nigerian health and foreign affairs officials during the visit before leaving the country on Wednesday.
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5 killed, dozens injured in clashes over Bangladesh jobs quota system
At least 5 people were killed and dozens injured in two separate incidents in Bangladesh as violence continued Tuesday on university campuses in the nation's capital and elsewhere over a government jobs quota system, local media reports said quoting officials.
At least three of the dead were students and one was a pedestrian, the media reports said. Another man who died in Dhaka remained unidentified.
The deaths were reported Tuesday after overnight violence at a public university near Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka. The violence involved members of a pro-government student body and other students, when police fired tear gas and charged the protesters with batons during the clashes, which spread at Jahangir Nagar University in Savar, outside Dhaka, according to students and authorities.
Protesters have been demanding an end to a quota reserved for family members of veterans who fought in Bangladesh's war of independence in 1971, which allows them to take up 30% of governmental jobs.
They argue that quota appointments are discriminatory and should be merit-based. Some said the current system benefits groups supporting Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Some Cabinet ministers criticized the protesters, saying they played on students' emotions.
The Bengali-language Prothom Alo daily newspaper reported that one person died in Dhaka and three others, including a pedestrian, were killed after they suffered injuries during violence in Chattogram, a southeastern district, on Tuesday.
Prothom Alo and other media reports also said that a 22-year-old protester died in the northern district of Rangpur.
Details of the casualties could not be confirmed immediately.
While job opportunities have expanded in Bangladesh's private sector, many find government jobs stable and lucrative. Each year, some 3,000 such jobs open up to nearly 400,000 graduates.
Hasina said Tuesday that war veterans — commonly known as "freedom fighters" — should receive the highest respect for their sacrifice in 1971 regardless of their current political ideologies.
"Abandoning the dream of their own life, leaving behind their families, parents and everything, they joined the war with whatever they had," she said during an event at her office in Dhaka.
Protesters gathered in front of the university's official residence of the vice chancellor early Tuesday when violence broke out. Demonstrators accused the Bangladesh Chhatra League, a student wing of Hasina's ruling Awami League party, of attacking their "peaceful protests." According to local media reports, police and the ruling party-backed student wing attacked the protesters.
But Abdullahil Kafi, a senior police official, told the country's leading English-language newspaper Daily Star that they fired tear gas and "blank rounds" as protesters attacked the police. He said up to 15 police officers were injured.
More than 50 people were treated at Enam Medical College Hospital near Jahangir Nagar University as the violence continued for hours, said Ali Bin Solaiman, a medical officer of the hospital. He said at least 30 of them suffered pellet wounds.
On Monday, violence also spread at Dhaka University, the country's leading public university, as clashes gripped the campus in the capital. More than 100 students were injured in the clashes, police said.
On Tuesday, protesters blocked railways and some highways across the country, and in Dhaka, they halted traffic in many areas as they vowed to continue demonstrating until the demands were met.
Local media said police forces were spread across the capital to safeguard the peace.
Swapon, a protester and student at Dhaka University who gave only his first name, said they want the "rational reformation of the quota scheme." He said that after studying for six years, if he can't find a job, "it will cause me and my family to suffer."
Protesters say they are apolitical, but leaders of the ruling parties accused the opposition of using the demonstrations for political gains.
A ruling party-backed student activist, who refused to give his name, told The Associated Press that the protesters with the help of "goons" of the opposition's Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-e-Islami party vandalized their rooms at the student dormitories near the Curzon Hall of Dhaka University.
The family-of-the-veterans quota system was halted following a court order after mass student protests in 2018. But last month, Bangladesh's High Court nulled the decision to reinstate the system once more, angering scores of students and triggering protests.
Last week, the Supreme Court suspended the High Court's order for four weeks and the chief justice asked protesting students to return to their classes, saying the court would issue a decision in four weeks.
However, the protests have continued daily, halting traffic in Dhaka.
The quota system also reserves government jobs for women, disabled people and ethnic minority groups, but students have protested against only the veterans system.
Hasina maintained power in an election in January that was again boycotted by the country's main opposition party and its allies due to Hasina's refusal to step down and hand over power to a caretaker government to oversee the election.
Her party favors keeping the quota for the families of the 1971 war heroes after her Awami League party, under the leadership of her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, led the independence war with the help of India. Rahman was assassinated along with most of his family members in a military coup in 1975.
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