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WSJ: A Million International Students Pinch US Admissions
Roger_Dooley
Founder Posts: 106,392 Senior Member
An interesting article at the Wall Street Journal notes that 975,000 international students are enrolled in US colleges and universities this year, up 10% from the year before. Since most of these are full-tuition students, they are attractive prospects for financially strapped US schools. But, it's making it more difficult for US and in-state students to be admitted.
The article focuses on University of California schools, who accepted 62% of in-state applicants last year - down from 84% four years earlier.
According to the article, the UC schools are the most affected. Most other state schools have held in-state admissions steady. (The article doesn't describe the effect on out-of-state US students. Presumably, a full-pay international student might be more desirable than a domestic student who would need financial aid.)
Declining state subsidies in California, UC administrators say, make it necessary to admit more full-pay international students to keep in-state tuition low.
More: http://www.wsj.com/articles/foreign-students-pinch-university-of-california-home-state-admissions-1447650060
The article focuses on University of California schools, who accepted 62% of in-state applicants last year - down from 84% four years earlier.
According to the article, the UC schools are the most affected. Most other state schools have held in-state admissions steady. (The article doesn't describe the effect on out-of-state US students. Presumably, a full-pay international student might be more desirable than a domestic student who would need financial aid.)
Declining state subsidies in California, UC administrators say, make it necessary to admit more full-pay international students to keep in-state tuition low.
More: http://www.wsj.com/articles/foreign-students-pinch-university-of-california-home-state-admissions-1447650060
Replies to: WSJ: A Million International Students Pinch US Admissions
To put some numbers down, various articles indicate that the spending per undergraduate at UC is about $10,000 to $12,000 more than the in-state tuition of around $12,000, for a total of $22,000 to $24,000 (these figures do not include living expenses, books, etc.; out-of-state tuition adds $24,000 more for a total of $36,000).
Note that the article claims that the per student subsidy has fallen from $25,000 in 2001 to $12,000 now. In 2001, the tuition was about $3,000 for in-state undergraduates and $13,000 for out-of-state undergraduates ($4,000 and $17,000 after CPI adjustment to today's dollars). So the spending per undergraduate was presumably at least $29,000 in today's dollars back then (the article does not indicate whether the $25,000 is after CPI adjustment or not).
I.e. over the last 15 years, both tuition has increased and spending per undergraduate has fallen. It would not be surprising if something similar were observed at other state universities where the states have reduced funding.
From what I have been hearing, the financial aid for OOS students has dried up in most places anyway. So I am not sure that there is much advantage to the state schools one way or another. I would think this would be a bigger issue at the private schools where US citizens often need financial aid in one form or another.
I think one also has to keep in mind that having more international students can be a positive factor for all undergraduates and the faculty, but like most things it has to be balanced against other considerations and shouldn't be unchecked in its growth.
These students are liable to be disproportionately represented among the top tier of students at selective schools, and are exactly the sort of immigrant the US should be looking to attract. The efforts their native countries make to hold on to them and slow the brain drain are one indication of their value. We need more of them, not less.
How well integrated are the international students, would you say? With that high of a percentage, there would be critical mass for students to hang out with others of the same nationality, at least for the larger countries.
Next, that these international (undergraduates) students are the best and the brightest. In some cases, the US schools (like UCSD) were a second choice for internationals not able to get into the preferred domestic university (like Peking University or one of the Indian Institutes) and able to afford the expense to study abroad.
To be honest, if the parents can afford it, I don't blame them for wanting to avoid the whole "Gaokao" nightmare...
Finally, that some number of these international students are not "gaming" the system, in particularly the TOEFL and SAT. We've seen enough stories on cheating, to be cautions of any comparisons between international and domestic undergrads.
Of course, that doesn't even touch on the issue of "maternity tourism".
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-asian-anchor-babies-wealthy-chinese-20150826-story.html
http://admissions.berkeley.edu/internationalstudents
As of two years ago, the international admit rate at MIT (3%) was lower by far than the domestic rate (11%)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kat-cohen/the-truth-about-applying-_b_3654246.html
Some time ago, Voice of America had a stab at comparing international admit rates with overall rates at some upper-middle-tier colleges. With some exceptions (USC and MSU), the international rate was lower by double digits, than the overall admit rate. At Georgia Tech and Texas A&M, the international % wasn't even half the overall rate.
http://blogs.voanews.com/student-union/2012/04/27/how-admissions-rates-for-international-students-compare/
These are still just a few examples, but I feel - especially in light of the self-selecting nature of international applicants, as anyone who can pay US tuition is fairly well off - that the international pool is more competitive on the whole. The UC system seems an exception in that regard (though accepted international test scores and grades are a tad higher than those of admitted US students), perhaps because funding cuts have forced them to take more full-pay internationals to make ends meet.
I can't speak to the issues with the TOEFL/SAT or the 'maternity tourism' question, but I also believe US schools are often an international student's first choice, among the self-selecting population that is "kids mostly able to pay full tuition." Our school has seen many students turn down top local schools, and a few turn down Oxbridge offers, in order to attend a US college.
For top 40? schools, It is. It's not like the selective ones(say, top 50?) have certain quota, but they do limit the int. student numbers. I don't know why some people complain about we "stealing" their spots when they are evaluated under completely different categories; they separate domestics and internationals from the start!
But for many many state universities(excluding those like Umich, UVa, UCB, etc), I can't fathom in state kids "losing" spots to international kids. It's the states' fault that the state schools don't have enough funding.
Yet, people blame international/oos kids, not the government. It's not like we eat your tax anyway