ICE Confirms New Foreign Students Can't Take Online-Only Course Loads in the US
npr.org
npr.org
[1]: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/28/harvards-endowment-is-worth-...
It is possible to build it, of course. The problem I see with that method is you risk confusing the goal by focusing on the educational aspect too early on. What a persisting educational enterprise needs is scalability / and sustainability.
Take for instance Call of Duty Mobile, it is fairly easy with a little dedication to achieve LEGENDARY status in the Battle Royale mode each season. Such an effort requires focus, skill and dedication. What if Harvard had a mode beyond Legendary, where you had to train / skill-up in actual real world knowledge? Then as you achieved those rankings, you would get bonus / rewards.
I could envision a Chemistry track that took you through enough basics that you could solve in game problems. The same for Physics, Electronics and of course the easiest since it is already virtual, Computer Science / Programming.
The infrastructure is the hardest part. Adding the educational tracks is easy as it can evolve overtime.
Even though this reeks of prejudice, ICE is not entirely in the wrong on this one imo.
Education is not just watching someone explain to you what you are trying to learn. It's much more interactive and social.
If online courses can on their own be a substitute for the complete experience, then we actually don't need online courses: Just read a book and you can be brain surgeon.
Interact with the monitor...you realize that these schools will be closed, right, and all courses will be online?
I get that refusing to change rules is a bad thing, but it’s not the same thing as “implementing a policy.”
Historically, for the graduate student subset, a course load of 6 credit hours has always been the minimum requirement for face2face lectures in any particular semester. Under very specific circumstances (read: literally one course to graduation or similar) will the DSOs of their school mention the case on their SEVIS records and allow them to continue. Arguments can be made against the morality of not allowing students with improper internet access to come in. But don't let armchair experts lead you to believe it wasn't always this way. Because it was.
Still, I feel like this is not a good thing to do, people are there to study and losing bright minds like these should harm US a lot.
> The universities said in their court challenge to the latest policy that “by all appearances,” the government’s attempt to force international students to study on campus had also been a political move, calculated to advance the Trump administration’s agenda to force universities to reopen their gates with in-person classes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/coronavirus-internatio...
Of course the fact that this hurts immigrants is icing on the cake to the administration, but it seems like the primary goal of this was to use international student revenue as leverage to force universities to open.
(virtual, but nonetheless the student living in the same country as where the live lectures are being held, for the reasons I detailed in my other comments)
A large part of the appeal of an expensive USA graduate course is that it allows you a way to get a job in the USA after.
It works like this in tech. 1) Do a masters or > 1 year course in a relevant field. 2) after the course you have 1-3 years of occupational practical training in that field. This means you can apply and accept any relevant job without waiting for a h1b or anything like that.
Then from there you get your company to apply for a h1b and then convert to a greencard. Then from greencard you go to citizenship. This was my path.
Pressure on universities like this discourages foreign students from enrolling and hence stops or slows this processes.
Now I do agree that it might discourage some high quality people from going that route, but that's another story.
I think these days a masters in CS or a related field allows you up to 3 years of OPT. I.e multiple chances to apply for a H1B visa while working legally in the USA.
For more context: Currently theirs about 1 million f1 students in the USA and about ~500k h1b holders. Roughly 223k applied and got OPT in 2019. More figures can be found here:
https://www.cato.org/blog/facts-about-optional-practical-tra...
3 years of OPT gives a companies lawyers plenty of chances to apply, get rejected and then reapply. This is the case with my company right now. I.e the first step in our hiring processes is asking if you are authorized to work in the USA? A no answer equals likely rejection.
OPT increases the probability that you will be able to get a h1b.
If you reduce the number of students you narrow the funnel.
Over 2/3 of H1B applicants would have to be OPT extension recipients AND you'd have to assume there is no hidden demand that would resurface given a drop in applicants.
“ The WH is finally getting to its main goal, reducing immigration overall.”
Do you agree or disagree that discouraging foreign students will have an impact (even a small one) on immigration? It seems like it will.
Most pathways to immigrate to America are either capped, backlogged or hard enough that there isn't a ton of people using them.
If this was a strategic move by the WH rather than just ICE interpreting rules, I'd be much more willing to believe this is an action targeted at China given how many foreign students are Chinese. Or as someone else noted, a way to pressure schools to open up.
After your study is over you're supposed to go home [0]. Generally when applying for a non-immigrant visa you want to show that you have a good reason to go back home. Otherwise you'll probably be denied.
Say I had an F1 and now it's long expired. Have a standard B1/B2 now. If I wish to immigrate to the US this doesn't help me in any way. Other than just being in good standing with them I guess.
[0] or you could get some other visa, but if you're coming in with this intent from the get go this is potentially problematic
The difference between these visa types is that one can be used to apply for a change of status to permanent resident (green card) and the other does not.
If you want to get a green card and you have a non-immigrant visa, you have to apply to an immigrant visa first. There are exceptions but for temporary workers this is the case.
wohld be nice to have a more centric candidate who would have this persistance and 'idgaf, attitude.
but you probably need to be a psychopat to pull that off
As an European looking at the U.S., it isn't really a desirable place to be anymore, if it ever was. No universal healthcare during a pandemic? not wearing masks being considered cool & edgy?, sky high cost of living and even being treated with suspicion and the feeling that I am somehow not thankful enough to be in a COVID hotspot, while trying to not ever meet any law enforcement as the chances of surviving even a speeding ticket encounter are nowhere near as high as they are elsewhere in the world?
Doesn't sound too appealing, unless in a really desperate situation. The U.S. relied on soft power, (Hollywood), for decades to sell a manufactured image of how great it is, but with increased information sharing, I suspect this image is being eroded.
Not really. This sort of Caesarism and strongman attitude is a disease. Fucntioning governments and societies rest on pluralism and compromise between institutions, not on someone at the top "not giving a fuck".
This desire for "not giving a fuck" is at its core a childish attitude that's rooted in people not being able to live with the tension that occurs when diverse interests need to be taken into account.
It's usually combined with Machismo and it's pretty much what many Latin American countries perpetually suffer from.
An 'idgaf' attitude is extremist by its very nature.
That's a very generous interpretation.
(I know that Trump admin is not immigration friendly, but that's a different debate)
When this crisis is over, and students actually need to show up to the campus, then the student visa will make sense again.
The reasonable thing to do if immigration bans are absolutely necessary temporarily would be to issue admitted students visas now but block their use temporarily while instruction was purely online. This would remove the risk of foreign students spending tens of thousands on a program only to be forced to transfer if they can't get a visa later. Of course, the real purpose of this (along with the green card ban, h-1b bans, previous attempts at booting students out, etc) is to be deliberately unreasonable and hostile towards foreigners seeking to enter the US.
I was a dependent on an H1B in 2006 when I accompanied my parents to a consulate (outside of the US) to extend the visa. The State Department placed a "security check" on my parents and we ended up living for months on vacation pay and credit cards, with electricity stolen from the nearest power line and no hot water until my mom started going to the consulate every morning to bother anyone within earshot. We had been in the US for over a decade at that point (getting PhDs, paying taxes, etc.) and just like that we almost had to abandon our entire life here - pets, friends, careers, and all.
The ultimate irony was that we couldn't get work permits as illegal immigrants in Mexico to carry us through the ordeal.
1. Not every foreign student can afford a "paradise" on a Caribbean island
2. Not every foreign student has fast, stable internet and reliable electricity for online classes
3. Most of the world doesn't enjoy the free passport access US citizens have to the rest of the world.
I've had sites fail because my local time can be one calendar day _ahead_ of theirs... and how could you be doing something in the future?
Once you get into regions with a combination of censorship on the foreign-side and aggressive 'security' measures on the US-side (blocking/triggering on IP ranges of entire countries, VPN services, could services, etc... 'cause why would a legit user be coming in through anything like that, right?) then it really gets rough.
Generally, to reliably serve a country/region it requires specific expertise, personnel and/or infrastructure.
And BTW when I priced out a "reliable" connection in Beijing years ago it was around $1K USD/mo for 10Mb. Not exactly peanuts.
Please take in count that nowadays the most important value universities provide is networking.
And eventually some/many will remain in this country as ostensibly well educated new Americans.
Open borders or xenophobia is a false binary.
Removing consumers and producers from a market does not increase the "value of American's" [sic] because it reduces consumption.