
ICE changes exemptions for foreign students taking online courses in Fall 2020 - kediz
https://www.ice.gov/news/releases/sevp-modifies-temporary-exemptions-nonimmigrant-students-taking-online-courses-during
======
kkaranth
Such pathetic leadership. International students already in the country must
now either attend an in person class and risk their lives, or fly out from the
country with the highest number of infections and spread it to their friends
and family at home. Not to mention the loss to the research community.

I can’t see anything that is to be gained from this, other than pandering to a
xenophobic voter base.

~~~
tmoney9999
Only possible good thing I can see from a US student perspective is that it's
now more reasonable to go to grad school in US. Many programs in STEM have
gotten out of hand with the number of the foreign graduate students--in some
programs the number is over 80% [1]. I think this has led to the US educating
many persons who later leave the country for visa issues. Also, some of the
competition to get in can be considered bogus: near perfect GRE math which
measures high school level math skills is hardly germane for research.

[https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2017/10/11/foreign...](https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2017/10/11/foreign-
students-and-graduate-stem-enrollment)

~~~
65536
> I think this has led to the US educating many persons who later leave the
> country for visa issues

I’ve never been to the US but, if this is the problem then wouldn’t it be
better to make it easier for people to stay also after they have finished
their degrees? If the goal is to have a lot of highly educated people in the
US I mean.

~~~
VWWHFSfQ
USA educates more international students (by far) than any other country. I
think the goal of policies like this is to prefer US students. But you're
right that it would also be nice if foreign students had an easier time
staying in USA after they graduate.

~~~
dgoldstein0
It wouldn't just be nice - it'd be smart. We could probably have more
immigrant-owned business and immigrant-developed inventions of we made it easy
for foreign born US graduates to stay. Both of which should add jobs to the
economy and make the US more economically competitive.

~~~
VWWHFSfQ
I think everyone would support that kind of policy except where it would have
an adverse effect on American students. The goal of policies like this are to
promote USA students admission to higher education over foreign students. But
the reality is that foreign student tuition is a huge money-maker. So USA
students are at a disadvantage in the admissions process.

------
smnrchrds
> _Nonimmigrant F-1 and M-1 students attending schools operating entirely
> online may not take a full online course load and remain in the United
> States ... Active students currently in the United States enrolled in such
> programs must depart the country or take other measures ..._

This is going to ruin so many lives. An example of how this could result is
significant hardship for international students is the case of Iranian
students.

Iran has mandatory military service for all male citizens ages 18 and over.
People who are students can defer their military service until their studies
have concluded. If the studies are outside of Iran, the _temporary exemption
from military service for the purpose of education_ status allows students to
be present in Iran for a maximum of 3 months per year (approximate length of
the summer intermission, so students can have some vacation and visit their
family). Stays longer than that are deemed to be at odds with being an active
student in a foreign institution, so if a student is present in Iran for
longer than that, they are deemed to no longer be a student—the exemption is
invalidated and the person has to go through two years of military service
before they are allowed to leave the country again.

Any male Iranian student who is forced to leave the US due to this directive
is effectively expelled from their program. I am sure this is not a unique
situation. There are likely many other such edge cases that affect certain
demographics of students. I hope they reverse their decision, otherwise so
many careers will end before they even begin.

~~~
cm2187
I am not going to defend the Iranian regime or military services in general,
which I think is a waste of time for all parties. But is it the role of the US
immigration regime to circumvent military duties in foreign countries?

~~~
smnrchrds
My point was that there are likely hundreds of edge cases that ICE did not
think about (or care about) when they decided to change the rules. When you
create rules carelessly, people fall through the cracks. ICE has now created a
massive crack many will likely fall through.

Military service is just one of such cracks, there are likely many many more.
Just imagine how many people are likely to lose their scholarships (that is
their only way to pay for the program they are in) because this ruling
triggers a clause in the scholarship terms, how many mature students with
families now have to take their children out of school and out of country for
who knows how long and what the effect of this on those children is going to
be, ...

~~~
pandaman
Have the rules been changed though? These on-line education restrictions
(known as "Full course of study") had been in the law for a while, see 8 CFR
214.2(f)(6)(G) [1]. What ICE has done is a temporary suspension of
enforcement. Now they just resume normal operation. You could argue they had
to suspend it for longer but accusing them of changing rules seems bizarre as
what you actually want is for them to change rules (because current rules say
that F-1 students cannot do full-time on-line classes).

 _For F-1 students enrolled in classes for credit or classroom hours, no more
than the equivalent of one class or three credits per session, term, semester,
trimester, or quarter may be counted toward the full course of study
requirement if the class is taken on-line or through distance education and
does not require the student 's physical attendance for classes, examination
or other purposes integral to completion of the class. An on-line or distance
education course is a course that is offered principally through the use of
television, audio, or computer transmission including open broadcast, closed
circuit, cable, microwave, or satellite, audio conferencing, or computer
conferencing. If the F-1 student's course of study is in a language study
program, no on-line or distance education classes may be considered to count
toward a student's full course of study requirement._

1\.
[https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/8/214.2](https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/8/214.2)

~~~
copperx
That is true. But the difference is that students used to have a choice
(online vs in person classes), and now most don't.

To be honest, there is no purpose for most students to be in the US if they're
taking online classes. But there are a lot of edge cases (e.g., students doing
research in the lab, graduate students with a research stipend, students in
economical hardship with a part time job, etc.) I wonder whether there will be
exceptions for them.

~~~
sukilot
Classes are the smallest part of college.

------
paulgb
As some have pointed out elsewhere, the idea that "they can just do the
courses remotely from their home country" has some issues:

\- live classes may happen in the middle of the night

\- tools like GSuite are blocked in China

\- internet connection quality varies

Given the amount of revenue foreign students bring in, this seems like the
admin is using access to those students as a lever to force schools to reopen
prematurely.

~~~
Shank
There's also the sad reality that for many students, it's not possible to work
unimpeded on school work at home. For many, university is the a psychological
retreat from home circumstances that are distracting at best the best of times
and downright abusive at the worst. It doesn't matter if your Internet is
solid if you can't actually focus on the work.

~~~
Balgair
Post quals grad students are going to be hard pressed to get a PCR machine,
vivarium, or fluoroscope up and running in their parent's house. You know,
machines vital to figuring out covid vaccines.

I've no idea how most of them will get any quality lab-bench research done. It
pretty much nukes them.

~~~
VWWHFSfQ
Campuses are going to be closed in the Fall. Nobody is going to have access to
those things.

~~~
Balgair
I know a few grad students at 'closed' campuses currently. Though the admin
says the labs are off limits, the PIs are turning blind eyes to it. The labs
are effectively open.

~~~
VWWHFSfQ
> Though the admin says the labs are off limits

so the labs are closed then, despite your anecdotal evidence to the contrary.

~~~
Balgair
I mean, they are closed, but a lot of people seem to come in anyway and do
things just as before, so I am told.

Define that how would wish to.

------
Balgair
Most relevant part:

"Active students currently in the United States enrolled in such programs must
depart the country or take other measures, such as transferring to a school
with in-person instruction to remain in lawful status. If not, they may face
immigration consequences including, but not limited to, the initiation of
removal proceedings."

I wonder if the Harvard decision today will be modified in response to this. I
imagine their international students, especially in graduate studies, must be
highly impacted.

~~~
chanmad29
Probably international students will now attend in person classes and others
will be fully remote. Weird to even think that such drastic changes are all
happening during a pandemic.

~~~
golem14
Agree. I wonder what is the rationale for all this. Other than plain old
xenophobia.

Will this reduce pandemic ? No, it will incentivize colleges to offer in-
person classes promoting COVID.

Will this reduce students on non-immigration visas ? Not sure it does
(students might find in-person classes somewhere). Some students might just
say 'fuck it' and study elsewhere. Maybe that's good for them.

Will this reduce unemployment? Maybe. But I'm doubtful. Most F1 students are
barred from working off campus other than internships, and I doubt on-campus
work and internships make a dent in unemployment.

~~~
cm2187
Plain old xenophobia? How about double digit unemployment rate? We can debate
the means. But I can understand why Trump would want to cut down on
immigration.

Now a good question is whether there will be unemployment among highly
educated people with STEM degrees, who were in hot demand only a few weeks
ago, and if not this is counterproductive. But every economic indicator seems
to point at a major recession (beyond a technical recession during the
lockdown). I would assume everyone will be impacted.

~~~
esalman
You may not know this, but graduate research assistants make less than what
many Americans get in unemployment benefits. You are basically getting
cutting-edge research work done by non-immigrants for that money. Do you think
it is more beneficial for your country to pay a US citizen for doing nothing?

I am a GRA and I work on translational research in neuroimaging and data
science. With my career prospects dwindling, I'm considering leaving US if the
president gets reelected.

~~~
sukilot
Unemployment payments are temporary, not 4 years.

~~~
esalman
Yes, once you get employed you keep making even more.

------
actuator
This has become so absolutely stupid at this point. I can even maybe
understand this for future admissions. But from the messaging it looks like
they want to deport students who came after a valid visa process. This is just
absurd.

I hope unis do a hybrid thing like CMU, otherwise it is a lot of pain for
students who are already here.

------
whoisjuan
This reads like "open your campuses or go fuck yourself". International
students make up 6% of all the students in the US with certain institutions
probably averaging very large numbers of international students.

This is the sad current state of affairs in this country. A pandemic became a
political weapon.

~~~
airstrike
At Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management, currently ranked the third
best business school in the country, 32% of students are international.

[https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/programs/full-time-
mba/...](https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/programs/full-time-mba/student-
culture/class-profile.aspx)

------
contemporary343
This is lunacy. Also likely will fail in court since it doesn’t follow proper
procedures - something the recent Supreme Court DACA ruling pointed out. These
nitwits are cruel and incompetent. But all of this has damaged America’s
higher education system and its attractiveness to foreign students for the
long term. Many an economics PhD thesis will model GDP lost from doing
everything in our power to scare away educated immigrants.

~~~
mschuster91
> These nitwits are cruel and incompetent.

This is why I'm afraid of Pence getting President in the event Trump catches
corona or has a heart attack or whatever. Or for whatever the Republicans put
up after Trump. Because right now the only thing that keeps this
administration from doing massive unrepairable damage is their own
incompetence because Trump took a bunch of yes men as his advisors and
Cabinet.

A government filled by someone with the malice of the current Republicans and
the competence of actual professionals? Good night democracy.

------
dzdt
This also pressures universities to have in person classes regardless of the
safety of that practice. Universities want to support their students, and
indeed one of the draws of many university programs for international students
is the entry into the visa system for employment in the U.S. One effect of
this policy is to push universities to NOT be in the online-only category,
even if it means risking lives by a policy the school would have otherwise
preferred to avoid.

------
zaroth
I don’t understand how universities think they can get away with charging full
tuition to students while offering online only classes. I would be so furious
if I was stuck in this situation of trying to graduate on time but being
scammed out of the whole experience I worked so hard to get in to.

If the schools feel so strongly against reopening they should waive their
tuition for anyone already enrolled to attend online and close enrollment to
new students, and give anyone the option to defer if desired.

I don’t blame ICE for not extending their exemption past the summer for online
classes. The visa does not allow for online courses. Schools are not making an
evidence based decision here, and should not expect special treatment if they
aren’t willing to offer actual classes. I hope the students who are suing will
prevail in court for unjust enrichment.

~~~
PaulDavisThe1st
> I don’t blame ICE for not extending their exemption past the summer for
> online classes.

1\. difficulty of returning home 2\. risk of pandemic spread by returning home
3\. internet connectivity issues 4\. timezone issues 5\. software availability
issues 6\. home suitability for studying 7\. ....

"I don't blame ICE". Destroy ICE. This is appalling.

When I became a citizen 3 years ago, I told people that one motivation was
that I was very very slightly afraid of Trump even though I was a white
european permanent resident of 28 years. It's only taken 3 years to get to
where I'd say "not imminently but genuinely afraid" for that sort of
immigration status.

~~~
zaroth
The schools really should have thought through of all this before canceling
classes on all their students who depend so much on attending them.

There’s no excuse for outright canceling classes. Classes can absolutely be
held safely, if these universities simply chose to invest in the training,
procedures, and equipment necessary to do so.

Instead they chose to bank their tuition payments and setup a Zoom call.

This is not a new policy, student visas have never allowed for online classes,
and the universities certainly knew this. I think the blame pretty clearly
lies with schools who decided to close up shop.

~~~
PaulDavisThe1st
> There’s no excuse for outright canceling classes. Classes can absolutely be
> held safely,

Why do so few people actually charged with making this decision agree with
you?

And US college is about a lot more than classes.

~~~
zaroth
Probably because they didn't consider the downside to their decision. They
don't empathize with the students who can't possibly learn the material
without a classroom environment, or for those who worked and dreamed of
attending that University for years only to be sent the bill without most of
the benefit. To say nothing of those students who literally don't have a
(safe) place to live lined up besides being on-campus.

The people making the decision are Administrators who get paid hundreds of
thousands of dollars a year to cash the tuition checks and did the calculus
that they could shut down "for the safety of their students and faculty" and
still cash those checks.

> _And US college is about a lot more than classes._

Absolutely true. I'd say classes are no more than half of what you're paying
for. Harvard and Princeton just announced today that many students _will be
returning_ in the fall, but still taking classes online. They want freshman
and juniors to return in the fall, and sophomores and seniors to return in the
spring.

If the decision was simply based on the actual data, the reality is that the
student body is much more at risk from the drugs and alcohol on campus than
they are at risk from SARS-CoV-2. More to the point; if you take a holistic
view, the social, economic, physical and mental welfare of their student body
is massively degraded overall by canceling on-campus housing and classes
versus by holding them.

~~~
fzeroracer
What about the students that can't go to class because they're with family or
friends that are at risk? What about the immigrants who came here to get an
education that are now being kicked out because of the administration's
cruelty? Why are you encouraging something that would exacerbate the spread of
the coronavirus and celebrating forcing people to travel back home and
potentially spread the virus cross country?

Come on. This is a ridiculous thing to defend.

------
purple_ferret
>Nonimmigrant F-1 students attending schools operating under normal in-person
classes are bound by existing federal regulations. Eligible F students may
take a maximum of one class or three credit hours online.

This pretty nuts. From what I understand, even schools that are allowing
everyone on campus will have a majority of their classes online or have them
be up to the discretion of professors.

This may keep the vast majority of international students out of the US.

~~~
pdabbadabba
> schools that are allowing everyone on campus will have a majority of their
> classes online

That would make it not a "school[] operating under normal in-person classes"
but rather a "school[] adopting a hybrid model." No?

------
jswrenn
I had hoped my university (Brown) would follow Harvard's suit and err on the
side of remote instruction this coming year. With this policy announcement,
the chances of that dwindle.

Brown had made special accommodations to allow their international students to
remain in dorms over this summer. By eliminating extraneous travel, these
accommodations were in the best interest of both these students and the
general public. Who is served by expelling them!?

~~~
gumby
> Who is served by expelling them!?

The nativist agenda.

------
JMTQp8lwXL
This will further encourage universities to offer in-person instruction.
Paying top dollar for a sub-par online education is not what students are
after.

------
pseingatl
Chinese students will be safer in China. Bad news for US universities that
built dorms and counted on the cash from foreign students. Now they can't
come. Many families viewed studying in the US as a pathway to eventual
residence. That's gone, at least until there's a new administration.

~~~
tantalor
> until there's a new administration

197 days...

~~~
dariusj18
[https://www.timeanddate.com/countdown/to?msg=Time%20left%20u...](https://www.timeanddate.com/countdown/to?msg=Time%20left%20until%20a%20new%20administration&p0=263&year=2021&month=1&day=20&hour=12&min=0&sec=0)

------
christiansakai
the clown single handedly destroyed this country

------
A4ET8a8uTh0
Can someone offer a sensible reason for this policy? I am trying to look for
anything that would make it not look like an outright political decision, but
I can't.

~~~
Simulacra
As Speaker Pelosi said: Don’t let a good crisis go to waste.

------
IvyMike
If I were a school I'd be finding as many possible loopholes as possible.

One minute a semester in-person instruction per course, for starters.

~~~
njovin
*with the instructor being remote :)

I’m completely in favor of this guerilla approach to fighting stupid knee jerk
policy changes.

------
olliej
This is intended to punish foreign students - either move to an unsafe
university or get out and reset your visa. With a government that’s decided to
block visa applications arbitrarily.

Alternatively universities have to reopen to people so that it looks like they
agree with the absurd demands of the current administration to open earlier
than they should.

~~~
murph-almighty
And this is how you piss off a bunch of 18-23 year olds who may have had
foreign friends impacted by this. Maybe this gets the youth vote out?

~~~
foogazi
OTOH maybe their friends couldn’t get in because the spot went to a student in
a visa

------
benologist
I wonder how they feel about foreigners now working from home...

------
nine_zeros
Any prospective international student reading this should REALLY reconsider
education in the US. The administration is using everyone as pawns in a
massive game of vote pandering.

It's hard enough to study hard and achieve goals. Why come here where you will
be treated like unwanted foreigners at best and asylees who should be arrested
at worst?

~~~
Simulacra
International students should simply avoid America all together. There are too
many risks, consequences, and pitfalls to make it worth wild.

~~~
0xFFC
Sadly I made that decision few years ago and I regret it. I came into Canada,
and from what I see, industry and research is not even close to USA.

~~~
nine_zeros
> Sadly I made that decision few years ago and I regret it. I came into
> Canada, and from what I see, industry and research is not even close to USA.

All the research and industry in the US is shattered. Even if it isn't, the
administration is making sure it won't be accessible to you.

Don't have a view a America with rose tinted eyes. The America of the past is
gone, all vanished in the last 4 years.

------
PaulDavisThe1st
is there at least a countdown clock somewhere that marks the remaining time
until this is challenged in federal district court?

------
ilyaeck
#abolish_ice

------
tmsh
It's likely continued xenophobia from (the one non-family senior advisor to
Trump):

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Miller_(political_advi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Miller_\(political_advisor\))

------
calvinbhai
My hunch:

Trump hates universities. So he’ll do anything to ensure universities are on
life support. This is a great way for him to bring the uncertainties to follow
his orders.

------
theseawolf
This is a trick.

Trump is telling universities to open up for in person classes or lose all
their international students, who will mostly choose universities that have
in-person classes over online classes after ICE's ruling.

This is a diabolical move, arm twisting universities into opening up or else
losing international students - a major sources of revenue.

------
eiji
I doubt this decision is coming from the WH. It's a very simple calculation
made by an agency with different priorities from what might be represented
here in this forum.

You have thousands of foreigners, a large portion of which might not be in the
country, waiting to return to the US to continue their studies. Many of those
countries don't even allow US travelers to arrive at this time. Everybody is
urging for caution, but that there are thousands, if not hundreds of thousands
of individuals preparing to arrive back here, with possible infections, is
something an agency might be concerned about. So naturally, why not prevent
this travel from happening in the first place with a policy like that?

Of course it's a heavy handed approach, but so are the lock-downs and closed
schools. So we go to great length trying to prevent the spread, we close
schools for over 4 month, and some don't even want schools open in the fall,
but somehow an influx of half a million students is something nobody should be
concerned about?

Those are valid discussions to be had. Assuming right away that this is a way
to force universities to open is not a very genuine way of thinking. You
cannot encourage full online classes for health reasons, and applaud that on
Monday, and on Tuesday complain we don't allow students from all over the
world to return just to sit in front of a computer.

Everybody is laser focused on these case numbers, and some states will close
schools due to high case counts in the fall, impacting millions of families.
If you support that, you should probably also support any measures possible to
keep case counts low, including discouraging international travel.

~~~
aaomidi
> Active students currently in the United States enrolled in such programs
> must depart the country or take other measures, such as transferring to a
> school with in-person instruction to remain in lawful status. If not, they
> may face immigration consequences including, but not limited to, the
> initiation of removal proceedings.

Seems like someone didn't read the OP.

~~~
eiji
I read that. And again, this is a policy. You are not thinking this through,
in my opinion.

Think about this in a way an accountable official would think.

Most universities don't know what they will do yet in the fall. If you make an
exemption for people who are currently already in the country, what would that
solve? It would artificially pick those students over those who happened to
travel home for the summer. You can't do that. That would probably make such a
rule unlawful. So you have to craft such a "heavy handed" rule in such a way
that it doesn't have loop holes that can be exploited. Don't think lawyers
didn't review this exemption for weeks.

And my earlier points still stand.

I'm not trying to convince people that this rule is all that good. But
understand where it comes from, and don't think it's all because of a
particular administration. There is certainly logic to this rule. You may not
agree with it, but I might not agree with closed schools either.

~~~
aaomidi
> Think about this in a way an accountable official would think.

No they wouldn't. I've held various (small scale) public facing offices before
and this isn't how I would think.

Thinking of the consequences of your actions is a very important thing.

> If you make an exemption for people who are currently already in the
> country, what would that solve?

Decrease the damage done?

> So you have to craft such a "heavy handed" rule in such a way that it
> doesn't have loop holes that can be exploited. Don't think lawyers didn't
> review this exemption for weeks.

They probably didn't. We've seen this administration do bullshit orders
before. This isn't a new one. Remember when they banned green card holders
from coming to the US and there was chaos for 12-24 hours until they came and
said whoops those are exempted?

> And my earlier points still stand.

Your wrong points do stand, yes.

> But understand where it comes from

I do. It's bullshit.

~~~
eiji
You are not addressing any of my points with any substance. But you have to
resort to cursing twice.

~~~
bdhe
The reason the other commentator thinks your post is bullshit because it
doesn't address the clause in the order that requires F-1 students _currently
already in the country_ to leave if classes are online-only. This order is not
done by some agency being thoughtful about covid19, it's about using the
pandemic to put out more xenophobia that the WH will more than approve.

~~~
aaomidi
Thank you. I just didn't see a point in discussing this further.

Isolationism and enforcing an extra set of standards on __others__ is always
disgusting to me. Especially when we've been failing at every step of the way
of this pandemic.

~~~
bdhe
True. You'll see later that the commenter simultaneously holds the view that
covid is overblown but also that we need to move heaven and earth to save
schoolchildren, while I bet they're in full support of Trump's asinine
"SCHOOLS MUST OPEN!" tweet.

