Politico | United States colleges beg Joe Biden to save international student enrolment
- Students from abroad often pay the full price on tuition and fees, making them desirable to admit
- American colleges and universities lost billions of dollars when the coronavirus pandemic scattered their students and turned off new applicants
This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Bianca Quilantan and Lauraine Genota on politico.com on May 29, 2021.
A steadily growing pipeline of cash for US colleges and universities from international students was abruptly cut off with the pandemic. Now higher education institutions are looking to the White House to shore up a besieged visa process to bring those lucrative students back.
American colleges and universities lost billions of dollars when the pandemic scattered their students and turned off new applicants. Now, their autumn terms are still uncertain as they do not know yet how much international student enrolment they can get amid a coronavirus-rattled US bureaucracy.
“When you add in other factors of community development, they’re innovators and creators, it could be quite a disaster long term if they can‘t get in,” said Elizabeth Goss, a Boston-based immigration lawyer who specialises in obtaining student visas.