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Why is this such a problem? So they go back home for a year, save lots of money on US rents, stay enrolled, then come back once in-person classes start again? i

Why is this such a problem? So they go back home for a year, save lots of money on US rents, stay enrolled, then come back once in-person classes start again? is there any evidence that universities want to disenroll these students and therefore lose their extremely high tuition fees?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
tazedsoul 6y ago
Ah, optimism and assumptions.
orm 6y ago
Well, first, some schools are going online only for the latter half of the semester. But my understanding of the current guidance is that this is not enough to meet the in-person requirements, and so students may have to leave anyway and miss that half. Second, intl. travel is highly disrupted already and will continue being so. Some countries will fare worse under covid than others, and so students may get stuck, even after their school states are doing better. No guidance was given on students from travel ban countries, who were already here after the travel bans. Third, student visas expire. Visa politics are very volatile lately. Summing up, many people are now subject to gratuitous uncertainty about whether they'll be able to come back in at all over the next 12 months. Suppose you have to leave, a lot of people have already signed leases, etc. Finally, the guidance so far is quite ambiguous. It is not clear who is able to remain and who won't, and my department sent an email basically saying they are waiting for extra information to know what's going on. That already is bad in itself.
- zjs 6y ago
  An additional challenge is that classes will, almost certainly, be scheduled based on "local time". Students attending from other countries may find themselves needing to significantly time-shift their studies.
  - thomaslord 6y ago
    This is definitely a major issue - the US has a lot of students who come in from China, which would require a very significant time shift. Those students may also not be able to access the digital resources they need for class due to internet censorship, or they may simply be unable to join live class sessions due to latency or overall speed issues.
    - jeegsy 6y ago
      Ah, China...I see
    - zjs 6y ago
      I had overlooked the potential impact of internet censorship. It seems like it would be very hard to take a graduate-level class without access to resources like Google Scholar.
- ghufran_syed 6y ago
  Those are excellent points, thank you

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

tazedsoul 6y ago

Ah, optimism and assumptions.

orm 6y ago

Well, first, some schools are going online only for the latter half of the semester. But my understanding of the current guidance is that this is not enough to meet the in-person requirements, and so students may have to leave anyway and miss that half. Second, intl. travel is highly disrupted already and will continue being so. Some countries will fare worse under covid than others, and so students may get stuck, even after their school states are doing better. No guidance was given on students from travel ban countries, who were already here after the travel bans. Third, student visas expire. Visa politics are very volatile lately. Summing up, many people are now subject to gratuitous uncertainty about whether they'll be able to come back in at all over the next 12 months. Suppose you have to leave, a lot of people have already signed leases, etc. Finally, the guidance so far is quite ambiguous. It is not clear who is able to remain and who won't, and my department sent an email basically saying they are waiting for extra information to know what's going on. That already is bad in itself.

zjs 6y ago
An additional challenge is that classes will, almost certainly, be scheduled based on "local time". Students attending from other countries may find themselves needing to significantly time-shift their studies.
- thomaslord 6y ago
  This is definitely a major issue - the US has a lot of students who come in from China, which would require a very significant time shift. Those students may also not be able to access the digital resources they need for class due to internet censorship, or they may simply be unable to join live class sessions due to latency or overall speed issues.
  - jeegsy 6y ago
    Ah, China...I see
  - zjs 6y ago
    I had overlooked the potential impact of internet censorship. It seems like it would be very hard to take a graduate-level class without access to resources like Google Scholar.
ghufran_syed 6y ago
Those are excellent points, thank you