Global: International Graduate Enrollments Rebound

The number of new graduate students from overseas increased by 4 percent in the fall of 2019, the first growth since 2016. [Global] Hello, I’m Karin Fischer, and I write about international education. This is some of the news I’m following this week: International Graduate Enrollments ReboundThe number of new international graduate students enrolled in American colleges increased by 4 percent in the fall of 2019, the first growth since 2016, according to the [Council of Graduate Schools](. Though modest, the increases were a rare piece of good international enrollment news. The number of new graduate students from China ticked up by 3 percent, while those from India, which is second to China as a source of foreign students, were essentially flat. But all growth is not created equal — while enrollments went up at the most research-intensive universities, they fell at less-selective institutions. Turn to the next edition of my global education newsletter, [latitude(s)]( for more analysis of the international graduate-student trends. ADVERTISEMENT [advertisement]( Judge Rules Against Administration Policy on International StudentsA federal judge has blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from enforcing its "unlawful presence" policy, which could have [barred]( international students from the United States for relatively minor visa infractions. In the [ruling]( the judge said that the Trump administration failed to follow proper notice-and-comment procedure in promulgating the policy. The permanent, nationwide injunction follows a temporary one in May. Plaintiffs in the unlawful-presence case [praised the judge's decision](. “International students and the campuses that depend on them are breathing a sigh of relief today," said Jane Fernandes, president of Guilford College. Still, the judge’s ruling focused on failures in the administrative process, not on the policy itself, and the government can now propose a new regulation. Trump Budget Would Cut International-Education ProgramsThe [proposed budget]( released Monday by the White House would enact serious cuts in academic exchanges and other international-education programs. The budget would eliminate all international and foreign-language programs under the U.S. Department of Education, which the Trump administration says are duplicative of programs offered by other federal agencies. In addition, the budget proposes cutting by more than half the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, which runs the flagship Fulbright Program and other academic and cultural exchanges. The budget document argues that the United States should have a more limited set of exchange programs that meet critical government needs. The president’s budget is just a starting point, of course, and in the past, there has been bipartisan support in Congress for funding international-education programs, even when initial cuts have been [proposed](. Secretary of State Warns of Chinese Threat to Higher EdSecretary of State Mike Pompeo warned of Chinese “infiltration” in a [speech]( to the National Governors Association, singling out colleges as a point of vulnerability. China, he told the governors, uses Chinese students to sow discord on American campuses and pressures them to report back to the government on their fellow students. Through talent-recruitment programs, China is seeking to poach American intellectual property and expertise. “It shows depth. It shows systemization. It shows intent,” he said. Pompeo is the latest high-ranking public official to sound the alarm about Chinese threats to higher education, as American colleges have increasingly found themselves on the [front lines of geopolitical tensions](. Say Hello at #AIEA2020I typically use this space to cover the past week’s news. Instead, I want to talk about an event that’s coming up, the annual conference of the Association of International Education Administrators, this Sunday through Wednesday, in Washington, D.C. I’ll be leading two sessions at the conference. On Tuesday at 4:45 p.m. I’ll moderate a roundtable on the role of international educators in a new reality — a topic I [wrote about last year](. Then, on Wednesday at 11:45 a.m., I’ve got an all-star panel of D.C.-area international students sharing their perspective on studying in America. I hope you can check out one of these sessions. And please say hello — I love connecting with everyone and hearing your ideas about trends and pressing challenges I should be covering! 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