Major Changes to Student Visa Rules Proposed

When I was younger, I remember countries lamenting the brain drain to the US and saying that it was a major problem for research and education in a lot of countries.<p>I don&#x27;t think anyone would have ever imagined that the US government would be nice enough to try to solve that problem and give up willingly their advantage like this. It&#x27;s rare to see such altruistic leadership willing to sacrifice their own country for the good of others.

This specifically hurts foreign PhD students, because it routinely takes longer than four years to graduate from a PhD program. Considering some graduate students are overwhelmingly foreign (81% for Electrical Engineering, 69% for statistics, even Agricultural Engineering is majority foreign), what will this do for science and engineering? Will these students study someplace else, will they continue to study in the US regardless of this change, or will they simply be less educated.<p>If they study someplace else then the US loses some competitive advantage of attracting highly educated and motivated individuals into the country where they often stay.<p>If they simply don’t become as educated then the entire world suffers as the envelop of science and engineering isn’t pushed by as many minds. Having more PhD electrical engineers in the world is a critical piece to having more and better electronics in the world.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.insidehighered.com&#x2F;quicktakes&#x2F;2017&#x2F;10&#x2F;11&#x2F;foreign-students-and-graduate-stem-enrollment" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.insidehighered.com&#x2F;quicktakes&#x2F;2017&#x2F;10&#x2F;11&#x2F;foreign...</a>

I don&#x27;t understand the point of this. Your stay is anyways only authorized for the time period specified in your I-20 (which can be extended by the university). Looks like a strategy to shore up visa fees for USCIS.<p>The biggest risk here is USCIS processing timelines are long and unpredictable. If you don&#x27;t get your visa extension approved within 240 days of expiry you would have to leave the country and get your visa stamped in the consulate. Major pain for students from Iran and China.<p>Instead of having a proper overstay tracking and enforcement system for individuals and universities abusing F1 visa they are punishing entire nationalities of students.

<i>Currently, student visas are good for “duration of status,” meaning students can stay in the U.S. indefinitely if they remain enrolled in school and otherwise abide by the rules relevant to their immigration status.</i><p>This is an asinine proposal. Visa != status. An (non-)immigrant can stay in the US as long as their status is valid, even with an expired visa. They only need a valid visa to come back on departing the US.<p>Rather than affecting frauds and overstays this will disproportionately affect the honest students who travel to their home country during vacations because they will now have to keep applying for a new visa more frequently.

Having to ask DHS for the authorization to continue your PhD after 4 years. Crazy.<p>It’s already far from guaranteed to be allowed to stay after a PhD. Now you won’t even know if you’ll be allowed to finish.

Are these (proposed) rule changes more in-line with other nations? I’ve looked at student visas years ago but many of them were very strict and required taking English competency exams, with extension requirements. And when traveling on a work visa I wasn’t allowed to even pay for classes.<p>“Among other changes, the proposed rule would limit the time students could spend in English language training to no more than two years over a lifetime and impose limits on the number of times students can change programs at the same degree level or move to a program at a lower degree level”<p>I’m actually surprised that wasn’t already a rule, and probably has been ripe for abuse!

&quot; ... citizens of countries with student and exchange visitor visa overstay rates exceeding 10 percent would only be eligible for two-year visas with the possibility for renewal&quot;<p>Why should the overstay rate inform the duration of a visa? I can understand it playing a part in whether a visa is issued or not. But if someone is going to overstay, a 1-day visa is also sufficient for them to overstay indefinitely.

&gt;Among other changes, the proposed rule would limit the time students could spend in English language training to no more than two years over a lifetime and impose limits on the number of times students can change programs at the same degree level or move to a program at a lower degree level<p>So, if you can&#x27;t learn English in two years you&#x27;re basically fucked?

If anyone assumes good faith in this they&#x27;re a fool. This is nothing but making it more onerous for non-US citizens and to essentially punish them for daring to want something that &quot;WE&quot; have.