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As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

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Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#71
post #10

This is bad news. People like Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, Elon Musk, founder of Tesla and SpaceX, not to mention CEOs of Google, Microsoft and Adobe all came to the US as students. Without the immigration of the brightest on the planet, the US will, over time, lose its edge.

Wikipedia says: "Brin immigrated to the United States with his family from the Soviet Union at the age of 6." A student?

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#72
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>go back home for a job Haha. Not really. American salaries, standards of living are among the highest/best in the planet. Plus an abundance of economic opportunities and relatively low discrimination compared to what one may face in other developed countries. These are the only factors which decide whether a family sends their kid to the US for higher ed or not. The degrees themselves aren't worth much at all. Unles…

If the degrees didn't matter, then they would not send their kids here in the first place. Most of the folks I ran into liked America but loved their countries of origin and looked forward to getting a job and doing well. I was not talking elite students (which is different from students at elite unis who can be a mixed bag)

The degrees open doors to high-skilled visa programs. Same reason many of my international coworkers have Masters degrees in CS - it massively increases the success rate at getting official permission to work in the US, even if employers themselves are indifferent to them.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#73
post #36
post #10

This is bad news. People like Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, Elon Musk, founder of Tesla and SpaceX, not to mention CEOs of Google, Microsoft and Adobe all came to the US as students. Without the immigration of the brightest on the planet, the US will, over time, lose its edge.

As other have pointed out, this is mostly about the schools losing full-tuition international students, ie.e "International students pay double the $6,445 tuition of Missouri residents" --which is insane. I mean, it's insane for in-state students to have to shell out 6.5 thousand a year for higher ed... The international students are typically those kids of parents who are perhaps middle to upper middle class in a fo…

> go back home for a job

I know lots of international students and the vast majority would like to get a job here. In fact, by and large most of the people I knew who returned to their home countries did so because they didn't succeed in finding a visa-sponsored job here.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#74

There are really three different downsides to this. First, the foreign students cross-subsidize the locals' education. There are large fixed costs to running a university and these students pay way above their marginal costs. So now the universities have fewer resources; hence cutting the newspaper funding etc. Second, the foreign students increase the schools' reputations and can collaborate with the faculty. Resear…

I wonder how many of these students come primarily for the subsequent job opportunities. If they were able to come for the education but not the subsequent OPT, would they still be willing to come? I've seen the tuition some of them paying like $50k/year and not sure how they can afford it unless they are hoping for big returns afterwards.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#75
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>go back home for a job Haha. Not really. American salaries, standards of living are among the highest/best in the planet. Plus an abundance of economic opportunities and relatively low discrimination compared to what one may face in other developed countries. These are the only factors which decide whether a family sends their kid to the US for higher ed or not. The degrees themselves aren't worth much at all. Unles…

You underestimate the value of an “overseas” degree in “developing” countries like China. A student who comes back to China with a US/UK degree will get preferential access to first-tier city resident permits, direct financial “housing” benefits from the city, a good job and faster career advancement and more besides. Some of those benefits are starting to get scaled back but it’s still a big advantage.

Sounds like in the current environment those are no longer advantages, considering China is home to some very good universities herself.

Also these degrees don't offer any substantial advantage in any of the other countries you mentioned.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#76
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have stats but given that in order to stay after an F-1 you need to have job lined up and getting a job as an F-1 is not easy and in addition seeing the vast majority of F-1 students I was acquainted with in UNI went back home after graduation, I would have to suggest the great majority do go back home, generally speaking.

There's a selection effect, but I think that everyone who's worked in Silicon Valley knows plenty of people who stayed on F-1 visas. So there's an anecdote that's the reverse of yours.

Yes but then you're talking STEM and stem may be about 30% of int'l students. Most int'l students are not STEM. I also knew international students in STEM and also most of them came here for a couple of semesters and went back home. Additionally we're talking state schools, many in the Midwest --places Silicon Valley does not often go to the well.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#77
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>go back home for a job Haha. Not really. American salaries, standards of living are among the highest/best in the planet. Plus an abundance of economic opportunities and relatively low discrimination compared to what one may face in other developed countries. These are the only factors which decide whether a family sends their kid to the US for higher ed or not. The degrees themselves aren't worth much at all. Unles…

You underestimate the value of an “overseas” degree in “developing” countries like China. A student who comes back to China with a US/UK degree will get preferential access to first-tier city resident permits, direct financial “housing” benefits from the city, a good job and faster career advancement and more besides. Some of those benefits are starting to get scaled back but it’s still a big advantage.

U overstated it vastly...In China, UK degrees got so inflated, many of which being one year master, that they are pretty useless now.Oversea working experience is still valued

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$$$ is why

Unless u get a job. It is pretty hard by itself, even harder under Trump. As an investment, its return is diminishing.

What? The returns to education are increasing. That’s why everyone’s going on about income inequality.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#79

There are really three different downsides to this. First, the foreign students cross-subsidize the locals' education. There are large fixed costs to running a university and these students pay way above their marginal costs. So now the universities have fewer resources; hence cutting the newspaper funding etc. Second, the foreign students increase the schools' reputations and can collaborate with the faculty. Resear…

> In my own PhD program, the productivity of the Americans was much lower than the foreigners. I think the bias has swung way too far the other way. Racism against Americans is still racism. Also, this applies mainly to undergrads (full paying students), not PhD students who are generally fully funded.

Regarding PhDs, grad international enrollment is declining.

Regarding the full-paying foreign undergrads, their tuition contributes towards the costs of the university that are shared. American students, especially at middle-ranking public schools, are hurt when schools lose their funding.

Regarding the "racism against Americans," there is no such race, and if there were one it would not explain research productivity. What would is the self-selection of who will go across the world to study something technical, the much better high schools in other countries, and in the mere fact that the rest of the world is a larger talent pool than the US. It is easy to think of reasons.

Re: As Flow of Foreign Students Wanes, U.S. Universities Feel the Sting

#80
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As other have pointed out, this is mostly about the schools losing full-tuition international students, ie.e "International students pay double the $6,445 tuition of Missouri residents" --which is insane. I mean, it's insane for in-state students to have to shell out 6.5 thousand a year for higher ed... The international students are typically those kids of parents who are perhaps middle to upper middle class in a fo…

> The international students are typically those kids of parents who are perhaps middle to upper middle class in a foreign country (JP, KR, TW, IN, CN, UK, AU, etc) who want to send their kids to an American school and get an "American" degree and go back home for a job Source? Most of the international students I went to school with are still here, working.

Most of the ones I did are still here also. But the students coming to the USA in the last few years paying full tuition studying in non-STEM areas have mostly gone back home. My wife’s cousin, for example, went back to China after getting a master’s degree in accounting from a school in Philadelphia. (I guess it is still different for CS majors, as they can easily get jobs in the states)
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