In light of some universities’ decision to hold classes primarily – or entirely – online this fall amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Monday that international students cannot remain in the U.S. if they take a fully online course load.
While this rule was already in effect, there were hopes, especially for student-athletes, that the rules might be waived in light of the pandemic. Besides the impact on athletics, many international students face challenges like vastly-different time zones, poor living circumstances, and problems accessing the internet in their home countries.
The ruling issued by ICE this week actually gives students more flexibility for hybrid class models than are allowed under normal visa rules, though it is a rollback of more open rules that were in place for the spring and summer semesters of 2020.
According to ICE, students facing fully-online semesters must leave the country or transfer to a school with in-person classes.
“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. The U.S. Department of State will not issue visas to students enrolled in schools and/or programs that are fully online for the fall semester nor will U.S. Customs and Border Protection permit these students to enter the United States. 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.”
International students may have “hybrid” (mixture of in-person and online) semesters, but schools have to certify them to the U.S. Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP). If a school begins the semester with classes on campus but has to switch to being entirely online, the same rules apply and schools have 10 days to alert the SEVP of the change.
Typically, students can only take one class or three credit hours online, but the new exemptions will allow students taking a hybrid schedule to extend beyond those limits.
The move comes as U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration push for the nation to reopen in spite of the pandemic. Trump tweeted Monday: “SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!”
Harvard and Princeton announced Monday that they will only invite students back to campus in groups segmented throughout the academic year. At Harvard, up to 40% of the undergrad population will be allowed on campus at once, with all freshmen coming in the fall and all seniors on-campus in the spring. Regardless of where students are based, however, they will take classes entirely online. At Princeton, freshmen and juniors will be allowed on campus in the fall, while sophomores and seniors will be there in the spring.
Last week, USC announced that it would move undergraduate instruction primarily online for the fall, save labs, studios, research courses, and selected others requiring in-person meetings; UCLA is taking a similar approach. The California State system announced in May that most of its campuses will remain closed for the fall semester.
It’s not clear at this time exactly what the new ICE rules mean for international collegiate athletes training at and attending American universities. There are other visa options besides F-1 and M-1 specifically designed for athletes to train in the US, but those visas sometimes offer restrictions on competing in collegiate athletics.
Cruel. Most international students in the states right now (who were waiting on the semester to start) cannot go back to their countries because our country and its administration are handling this so poorly. Many will be FORCED to become detained by ICE. How dare anyone defend this decision. If you are paying tuition for an American institution, you should be able to keep your visa.
for the love of all things good, please vote in november. ICE is so unnecessary.
If someone is enrolled at a school that is online-only this fall, couldn’t they just take 3 credit hours on the side at any in-person community college and stay in the US?
This is just par for the course for this administration. They want to curb all immigration. They shut down handing out green cards, no work visas etc. At face value it makes sense right? Hey its all online so take it from your home, you cant go to school anyway. There is no NCAA department at ICE. They could care less.
This seems to only serve the purpose of punishing the schools that don’t completely open. (which probably is the political intent) International students are really the only people who pay sticker price tuition and without them it will be a huge hit to the college system. It’s already going to be hard enough to get international students to come back over to continue their education in the epicenter of the virus. And convincing them to commit to online classes that take place in an entirely different hemisphere it’s going to be extremely hard. it’s already hard for kids who live on the west coast to virtually attend live lectures from eastern time zone schools, as their 8ams become 5ams. Now… Read more »
That first sentence and last sentence were excellent points to take into consideration, thank you. I think many people are not aware that colleges vigorously recruit foreign students because they are such revenue generators compared to in-state tuition revenue per student.
You making good cents!!
All over a pandemic the CDC is about to reclassify as non-pandemic given: Mortality rate for under 70 is .04% equal to the flu and 10 weeks of decline in mortality rate.
Politics aside, this really sucks for a lot of swimmers. I hope this doesn’t last, but I feel like its just hoping at this point.
If you are a recruited athlete you can only attend practice int he fall then you go home? No swim meets? How is this going to work?
You will be forced to leave the US. If ICE finds out you are in USA and not taking the classes in person as required, you face deportation and the school might lose their SEVP certification (meaning they won’t be able to issue any I-20s for international students). Students already outside U.S will not be able to get an F-1 visa from the embassies, and if they do have one already, they will be denied entry at the border.
This is absolutely massive not just for international student athletes, but all international students in general, and affects everyone, including PHD researchers and grad students who have put in a lot of work to be able to study in the US… Read more »
The portion highlighted here really isn’t the change though, right? As far as I’m aware, International students have never been allowed to take all online classes while on student visas. In fact, they’ve always been very limited in how many they could take.
The change is that now international students are actually allowed to take more online classes, and take part in a hybrid type program. Also, schools have to declare what exactly they are doing.
You can absolutely make the argument that, given current events, they should provide more leniency in the policy than they are and allow a full online program to satisfy visa requirements. You can’t, however, act like all the sudden they are pulling… Read more »
Think you’re right Coach. Allowing students on an F-1 visa to enter the US and lifting the travel restrictions from a lot of countries in Western Europe, including all of the UK, would have the most positive impact on getting international students back to their schools.
Yes. Absolutely.
but…are they going to lift the ban by august? since most european countries (26 countries of Schengen area), UK, Brazil, China still cannot enter the US and most schools start mid-August…