With a rich history of immigration, the U.S. is full of diverse neighborhoods, professional workplaces and educational settings. As laws and policies surrounding immigration continue to tighten, the opportunity to encounter international perspectives is less common, specifically in the classroom.
Ranked as the number one country for international student enrollment in higher education, the U.S. has served as a land of opportunity for many seeking to pursue their future careers at its institutions. Over the past few years, however, international enrollment numbers have begun to decrease.
In the U.S, international undergraduate enrollment decreased 2.2 percent from 2016 to 2017, and the decrease in international graduate enrollment was even greater during the same time, dropping 5.5 percent, according to a report by the National Science Foundation. This trend of decline affects various aspects of universities, especially financial departments.
International students are not allowed to receive federal financial aid and must pay their tuition in full, making their population a crucial asset in funding universities. In 2017, Syracuse University had 6,655 actively enrolled international students, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. With a basic cost of attendance of $64,463, international students brought the university nearly $430 million, or 32 percent of its total revenue, according to Syracuse’s 2017 Form 990, the tax filing used by non-profit groups.
As international student enrollment decreases, so does the income of universities. The trend does not only impact colleges financially, but its effects are also seen within the classroom and among students.
This year, at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, international enrollment in the graduate program has decreased about eight percent, Associate Dean for Professional Graduate Studies Joel Kaplan said, and as students are applying this year, he believes it will continue to decrease in the future.
“There’s the political environment that we’re in, it’s more difficult to get visas for one and I think international students don’t feel as though they are welcome,” Kaplan said.
Syracuse University has resources in place to welcome and aid international students in settling into a new country, such as the Slutzker Center for International Services and the English Language Institute. Despite these support systems, Lianza Reyes, a junior at Syracuse from the Philippines, believes that being an international student on campus continues to be a difficulty.
Living on a student visa in the U.S, Reyes’ professional opportunities in America are limited. In the past, she has sought advice from professors concerning her next moves in her career, only to leave empty-handed.
“It feels that sometimes professors can see the talent I have or they see the potential in me,” Reyes said. “But they don’t know how to navigate through understanding the legal paperwork or the extra mental jumps it takes for me to even get to the halfway point of what a domestic student can go through.”
A decrease in international enrollment will not ease these issues in the environment surrounding international students. The impact will not only be felt in the classroom, but it will have a worldwide effect, Dean Joel Kaplan said.
International students bring a different perspective to American classrooms, and they give domestic students the opportunity to interact with individuals of different cultural, educational and governmental backgrounds. The exchange does not end there, Kaplan said. After attending American institutions, international students can bring what they learned back to their home countries and be tastemakers in their fields there.
“It’s like a win-win. For the students it’s great because they get exposed to other cultures, how other people live and work and think,” Kaplan explained. “And for us it’s great to kind of expand our knowledge beyond our borders.”
This small-scale exchange of education between American universities and students from different countries is at risk, though. The current political environment in the U.S. surrounding immigration may be one of the main reasons international students are beginning to look to other countries, such as Canada and those in Europe, for educational opportunities, said Kaplan.
Following the U.S, the United Kingdom and China rank highest in international student enrollment. Ray Kung, an international student from Taiwan studying at Johns Hopkins University, said he has noticed a rise in interest in European universities among international students, especially in Asia, due to less expensive tuition and greater opportunities.
“A lot of the international students like fashion and stuff, and there’s also a lot of fashion arts in Europe, like in London and stuff like that. Stuff like hotel management, like in Switzerland,” Kung said. “I feel like a lot of it is having more diverse interests, and that’s why they’re going to Europe.”
Cheaper tuition and different opportunities are not enough to pull other international students away from pursuing an education in the U.S, though. For Sajida Ayyup, getting her master’s degree in journalism in a country where freedom of the press is a major part of its identity was much more important than penny-pinching.
Ayyup got her undergraduate degree in engineering in her home country of India, but when it was time to decide on where she would go to graduate school for journalism, her educational options held more weight.
“India is a country where journalism is kind of restricted, so it solely focuses on politics and religion. So much that you don’t have any sort of freedom of speech,” Ayyup said.
She eventually settled on getting her master’s in magazine, newspaper and online journalism at Newhouse, despite being advised by her friends and family to go to Europe instead.
The power of the influence peers and family members have on college decisions is not to be underestimated. Dean Kaplan said finding effective strategies for drawing in international students has always been challenging. Word-of-mouth has historically been the driving factor in international student applicants, Kaplan said. Students who attend Syracuse for their undergraduate or graduate degrees return home overseas and share their experiences with others who are considering applying in the future, and the cycle continues.
Ayyup, however, believes an even larger influence should be utilized to combat decreasing international student enrollment: the hope for employment. According to the Syracuse website for international admissions, nearly 60 percent of graduates were hired through a connection they made while on campus, though it is not specified what percentage of those students were domestic or international.
“International students, some of them, I’m not speaking for all, but some of them want to get employed at the end of graduation, in the master’s program specifically,” Ayyup said about getting hired in the U.S.
Employment after graduation for international students, however, is a challenge. Students must find a company that would be willing to sponsor their work visa application and hire them, which is an expensive and complicated process. It is even more unlikely for visa applications to be accepted for entry-level job applicants, which includes most college graduates, said immigration lawyers Catarina Ranieri and Anna Putintseva.
Work visa applications are categorized in four levels; the higher the level, the more skilled the applicant is.
“What concerns level one, those would generally be heavily scrutinized, and they will look for reasons why not to approve them,” Putintseva said, adding that level two applicants tend to be the lowest level considered.
Another work visa application, the O-1 visa, is for individuals who exhibit extraordinary ability or who show extraordinary achievement in their fields. Ranieri specializes in working with these types of visas, which if the applicant qualifies, does not require that the sponsor pays for application fees. To qualify, applicants must meet at least three criteria set by the U.S. government, said Putintseva.
“Have you won awards? Have you been published? Have you written articles? Have you judged events? And all related to your field of work,” Ranieri said, explaining the types of questions she asks when determining whether an applicant could qualify for an O-1.
Just last year, Ranieri worked with a recent graduate who was approved for an O-1 visa, but it’s not quick or easy work, she said.
“Just know all your options beforehand; know what possible paths there are that you can take,” Ranieri said. “The best time to plan is while they’re doing their studies.”
Despite the negative conversation surrounding immigration policies in the U.S, Ranieri and Putintseva do not think it should discourage students from seeking opportunities in America as there are always resources available.
“We’re always available to come out and talk to [students],” Ranieri said.
Making resources known to students and helping them adjust once they have enrolled should be universities’ next steps in overcoming the effects of the political environment in the U.S. and battling decreasing international student enrollment, Joel Kaplan of Newhouse said.
The decline in international enrollment is a concerning issue in all fields, but educators aren’t willing to give up the fight.
“You want the best and the brightest to come, no matter where they’re from,” Kaplan said.