There are no American students studing engineering. Or at the very least, precious few of them. Pay a visit to your friendly, neighborhood university, mosey on down to the engineering and/or computer science departments, wait until the classes break and tell me if you hear the English language being spoken among the students between classes.
They're funded by their own government or ours. Their tuition is paid, in full in most cases, by the same sources with no massive student loan debt. They make the liberal, Dr. Feelgood university administrators feel good about overturning the injustice of the oppressed peoples of color of the third world. And they're willing to work for $0.15 a day and no bathroom breaks.
Universities go ape over foreign students. George Bush gets millions of dollars in corporate campaign contributions. And his corporate handlers get to enhance their bottom lines and stock prices by virtue of cheap labor.
Consider it the geopolitical hat trick. In the meantime, any kid worth his salt would be insane to tap dance down the engineering/hard science road to perdition. And they know it.
I am. At night part time.