Joint Statement on ICE Barring Foreign College Students If Their School Operates All Online for Fall Semester

For Immediate Release
July 8, 2020

Contact: Andrew Farnitano, 925–917–1354, andrew@crawfordstrategies.com

BOSTON — In an announcement made late Monday, ICE stated that foreign students attending schools operating entirely online in the Fall will have to leave the US or face deportation. Prior to this decision, ICE had issued temporary exemptions, allowing foreign students to stay in the US while continuing their education remotely in the Spring and Summer.

College access nonprofit Inversant and the Hildreth Institute, a non-profit research and policy center dedicated to restoring the promise of higher education as an engine of upward mobility for all, today released the following joint statement regarding the decision:

“After barring travelers, including students, from a half-dozen predominantly Muslim countries, and efforts to impose limits on Chinese students, the Trump administration continues its vicious assaults on legal immigration and higher education.

“In the midst of the Trump administration’s botched management of the pandemic, schools made the responsible decision to shift from in-person to remote learning. Not extending ICE’s remote learning exemption to the Fall semester is cruel and unconscionable. With so much uncertainty and an ever-changing landscape, the decision leaves international students scrambling with impossible decisions.

“Hundreds of thousands will either have to return to their home countries, where they may not have the means or the infrastructure necessary to keep up with their online education or transfer to a school that offers enough in-class learning to qualify for a visa. But even then, as the pandemic continues to rage on, schools may choose to switch to an all-online education. This will put more international students at risk of deportation. Many will see no choice but to leave the US or transfer to an institution in their home country or a more welcoming country. Even still, this may not be an option for many students who face travel restrictions.

“Not to mention the huge blow to American higher education institutions this would be. Tuition and fees alone from foreign students bring $2.5 billion yearly to our higher education institutions. The potential loss of this revenue source will, unfortunately, also incentivize already financially struggling schools to make risky decisions to stay afloat such as offering in-class education to keep international students’ immigration status valid even though the pandemic remains a serious health threat.

“We urge ICE to reverse its decision and extend the temporary exemptions to the fall semester. It is the right thing to do for our colleges, and for the international students we invite and welcome every year to our classrooms.”

Read our original response on the Inversant website

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Inversant empowers low- to moderate-income families through a three-pronged approach: motivating them to establish matched college savings accounts, providing family workshops and counseling, and helping families identify and apply for scholarships to minimize college debt.

Hildreth Institute is a non-profit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to restoring the promise of higher education as an engine of upward mobility for all. We believe that all students should be able to obtain a high-quality, zero-debt postsecondary education. We research, develop, and promote solutions for changes in public policies and institutional financial practices that will reduce costs to students and improve quality. Through partnerships with researchers and policy experts, with politically diverse organizations, with policy makers from both major political parties, and with corporate and community leaders, we will build support for transformative change in higher education financing. Hildreth Institute is a member of the national Higher Ed, Not Debt coalition, a campaign of dozens of organizations dedicated to tackling the crippling and ever-growing issue of student loan debt in America.