BU leaders have submitted a letter in opposition to the Department of Homeland Security’s proposed time limit for international students. Photo via AP/Charles Krupa

University News

BU Leaders Submit Letter to Homeland Security Regarding Proposed Cap on International Students’ Time in the US

The four-year cap “would hurt our international students and scholars,” President Melissa Gilliam and Provost Gloria Waters write in a letter supporting BU’s international community

Boston University has submitted a letter to the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) opposing its proposed four-year cap on the time international students can spend at US universities. Citing the National Science Foundation, the letter said that students nationally require a median of 5.7 years to complete a doctoral program, which is identical to BU’s median. 

“The proposed rule would hurt our international students and scholars, who are vital members of the BU and US community, undercut our ability to attract and retain the best talent in the world, and hold back our country’s economy and global competitiveness,” BU President Melissa Gilliam and University Provost and Chief Academic Officer Gloria Waters wrote in a letter to DHS in late September.  

BU’s letter is part of a broader effort by colleges and universities to submit input about the proposed cap—both the Association of American Universities and the American Association of Medical Colleges also submitted letters opposing the cap. 

International students currently can remain in lawful status as long as they are studying in an academic program and working toward completion, and if they desire, can transition from undergraduate to graduate studies. The new rule, if enacted, would replace that policy, with limited exceptions, by establishing a fixed four-year period for certain visa holders.

DHS says that the proposed cap, which drew almost 22,000 responses, is necessary to decrease the number of students who overstay their visas. Students could request an extension beyond four years, although higher education experts say such requests are expensive and would prolong what is already a six-and-a-half month processing time for extensions. 

The BU letter, which was submitted as part of DHS’s open-comment period, noted the vast contributions by international students to American innovation and the economy—offering as examples the fact that international alumni of US universities launched one quarter of the $1 billion start-ups in the country, and that the CEOs of Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Google were international students educated in the United States. 

Gilliam and Waters wrote that the proposed cap would hinder undergraduate students’ flexibility in changing majors or programs, while prohibiting continuing education if it were at “the same” or a “lower” level than a student’s prior study. 

Willis Wang, BU’s vice president and associate provost for Global Programs, says the proposed cap would create “additional difficult barriers for international students seeking to change their degree paths, transfer between schools, or [acquire] additional time to complete a program.” And, he adds, it “will impede efforts to attract international talent to the US.” 

As for graduate students, the BU letter said, “Admission to several of our combined [graduate] degree programs is limited to students already enrolled in one of the degree programs, like our Master’s in Business Administration and Doctor of Medicine dual degree program. It is also common for a student who has obtained a graduate degree in a general field of study subsequently to pursue more specialized training in a program. 

“In addition,” the letter noted, “numerous individual and dual degree programs at BU take more than four years to complete, particularly in programs in the medical sciences, where students must acquire extensive knowledge as well as hands-on clinical experience.” 

“This would create significant uncertainty for students,” Gilliam and Waters wrote, “particularly those enrolled in a PhD, dual degree, or other lengthy programs, who would have no guarantees about their ability to complete their academic programs. Under the proposed rule, critical research initiatives and teaching could be jeopardized because professors and scholars would have to apply for an [extension of stay] mid-program without any certainty that they would be able to complete projects or instruction for which they were hired.” 

Gilliam and Waters concluded their letter by saying that international students are “critical to our communities, our leadership in higher education and research,” and on a broader level, to America’s economy and its global competitiveness.