Christians Under Attack

The number of foreign students admitted to American universities and colleges set a record this past fiscal year, U.S. officials said, indicating an end to an admissions slump after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

State Department officials issued more than 651,000 student and exchange visitor visas in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30 — a 24 percent increase since 2003, when foreign enrollment hit a low point, according to U.S. government statistics.

Texas universities and community colleges also saw a nearly 5 percent increase in foreign student enrollment in the 2006-07 academic year, compared with the previous year, according to a survey financed by the State Department and published by the nonprofit Institute of International Education, or IIE.

The study ranked Texas third in the nation among states for the foreign student enrollment and named Houston Community College No. 1 among community colleges.

Tougher visa restrictions enacted after 9/11 helped slow down the number of foreign students allowed into the U.S.

State Department spokesman Rob McInturff attributed the national increase to the agency's push to advertise study opportunities available in the U.S.

He also credited an administrative change by consular officials, who now can expedite applications for foreign students in danger of missing the start of the academic year because of paperwork.

Though the enrollment growth was celebrated by U.S. officials, some experts cautioned that American schools still face stiff competition for foreign students from countries including Britain, New Zealand and Australia.

And advocates for stricter immigration controls warned that the student visa program is "out of control," and needs to be cut back.

City is a magnet

 

In Texas, the number of foreign students enrolled in universities and colleges dropped slightly in academic year 2005-2006 but rebounded in 2006-2007 to more than 49,000, according to the IIE report.

The study also estimated the foreign students' expenditures in Texas at $995 million for the 2006-2007 academic year.

Houston is considered a magnet for foreign students, in part because of its diversity. The Census Bureau estimates more than 27 percent of the city's population is foreign born.

HCC and the University of Houston reported foreign student enrollment of more than 3,000 last year, said the IIE study, which is based on a survey of nearly 3,000 accredited U.S. educational institutions.

At the university level, administrators have worked to reach out to foreign students with advertising campaigns and through their Web sites. Sometimes, the efforts to make students welcome are more personal, administrators said.

On Tuesday, Deborah Unruh set out a table for a Thanksgiving meal for the foreign students at the Texas Woman's University Institute of Health Sciences-Houston Center. The student life coordinator made sure the dishes had labels, such as "orange smashed yams" and "turkey."

Some students at the dinner, such as Abimbola Adu, 24, a Nigerian nursing student, said they had no problems getting their student visas approved. Others said they were denied visas and had to re-apply.

A few stayed in the U.S. for years without returning home for fear that immigration officials would not allow them back despite having valid visas.

Jeanne Batalova, a policy analyst with the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., said to remain competitive, the U.S. should consider reforming its immigration system to allow foreign students to stay after finishing their degrees.

"The U.S. higher-education system is well-known around the world for its excellence and diversity, and those are the two main reasons why so many generations saw it as the place to come for higher education," she said. "The question is: Are these two things enough in the post-9/11 world?"

Perception, reality

After 9/11, the State Department increased the security and scrutiny involved in the background check, resulting in delays for students, particularly applicants from Middle Eastern countries, Batalova said.

 

The admission of foreign students and exchange visitors dropped to about 547,000 in fiscal 2002, according to State Department data.

"There was a perception that there was suspicion toward foreign students, that the country doesn't welcome them anymore," Batalova said. "So it was kind of a combination of perception and reality that led enrollment of new foreign students to drop, and that was a reverse of the increasing trend of the last five decades."

Meanwhile, she said, countries such as Britain, Australia and Canada tailored their higher-education programs to attract foreign students, in some cases liberalizing their immigration system to allow a path toward permanent residency.

But some critics of the current immigration system argue that the U.S. needs to go the opposite direction with its student and exchange visa programs. Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for stricter immigration controls, said the system is "out of control" and needs numerical and percentage caps.

"We admit way too many foreign students," he said. "It's become a tryout immigration program, rather than a way of training foreign elites to take skills back home."

Chance of rejection

 

To qualify for a student visa, students must show they are enrolled in an American college or university; that they have sufficient funds to pay for their first year of study; and that they intend to return to their home country when they finish their education. They also cannot work more than 20 hours per week for a job on campus.

Sarath Bodepudi, 28, applied for a U.S. student visa for the first time in 2004, but he was rejected twice before consular officials approved his application the following year. He said he was educated as a medical doctor in India and enrolled in the TWU's master's degree program in nutrition while he takes his qualifying exams to become a doctor in the U.S.

Like many foreign students, Bodepudi's chances of staying in the U.S. after college are uncertain at best.

"I would love to stay here and try and get into (a residency program), but if that doesn't happen, I don't have any other option," Bodepudi said. "I would have to leave the country and go home."

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