Post-Sept. 11 security laws have colleges scrambling

Taipei Times ^ | 07.21.03

[Enemy Of The State]

Post-Sept. 11 security laws have colleges scramblingTOUGHER REGULATIONS: American college officials are struggling with a system they say is flawed to register all foreign students with the federal authorities by Aug. 1

AP
Monday, Jul 21, 2003,Page 7

US college officials are struggling to meet an Aug. 1 deadline to register all foreign students with federal authorities under post-Sept. 11 security laws, but they complain many innocent foreigners could be denied an American education or even be deported due to computer glitches in the registration system.

Campus offices that deal with foreign students are cutting back day-to-day services and working 14-hour days, but administrators say they still are stymied in trying to load information into the Student and Exchange Visitor Information Service, known as SEVIS.

"The database is flawed. It couldn't have been done worse," said Gail Szenes, director of New York University's (NYU) Office for International Students and Scholars.

Foreigners omitted from the database will face strict scrutiny before their visas are renewed, and administrators fear some students will be denied visas unfairly simply because their names are not properly registered.

Worse, they say, is that some foreign students will feel compelled to turn elsewhere for higher education, creating tensions between the US and the young men and women likely to become influential leaders in their own countries.

Michael Brzezinski, director of the international students office at Purdue University, said that last summer 60 students at the Indiana school were denied visas or got them late, several for minor technical reasons. He said that until SEVIS is made more efficient, the trend will likely continue.

"There has been some damage done," he said. "I am aware of at least two government programs, in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia, that are now sending their students to other countries."

Chris Bentley, a spokesman for the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement that oversees the SEVIS system, said the agency would not be able to tell whether the stricter registration system had discouraged some students from coming to the US until full numbers would be available after the Aug. 1 deadline.

Downplaying any troubles with the system, Bentley said 950,000 names have been registered and predicted the number would reach 1.2 million by the deadline. He also said the SEVIS system should turn out to be an improvement.

"In the past we had an antiquated paper system," he said. "I think it is going to speed up the process through which students come to the US and allow that to be done more easily."

College officials argued, however, that the government had not fully developed the system when it mandated last December that all universities transfer their paper records on overseas students to the computerized system.

A trial version of SEVIS debuted in 2000, and just 20 schools had begun using the program in 2001 when the USA Patriot Act required all colleges to adopt the new system.

Although the government allocated US$36.8 million to the system, many college officials agree that lawmakers took disastrous shortcuts.

"We were just beginning to test the program in July 2001, and then 9-11 hit," said Catheryn Cotton, director of the International Office at Duke University, which was part of the SEVIS pilot program. "The new SEVIS system was written and pushed through so quickly that a lot of the kinks we worked out worked their way back into the system."

One of the most significant "kinks" is that the SEVIS program does not successfully deliver the students' information to the consulates which issue visas in their home country, college officials say.

Brzezinski at Purdue said his office receives about 15 e-mails each day from students overseas panicking that their records are incomplete.

At Michigan State University, Rosemary Max, assistant director of the Office for International Scholars, said her office has been bombarded with phone calls from distressed students.

"These students are anxious and angry with us ... and wow, it's killing us," she said.

Max said Michigan State has had several visas denied, adding she knows of some students who are now looking to Canada, Australia and the UK for an education.

Purdue's Brzezinski is not alone in observing governments shying from sending students to the US, though some of the resistance may reflect broader political problems rather than unhappiness with the SEVIS system.

A survey last year conducted by the Institute of International Education showed that some colleges reported a 30 percent decline in students from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, although 41 percent of schools surveyed said their total number of international applicants had increased.

[TheAngryClam]

Oh those poor innocent foreigners.

Studying in the U.S. is a privilege, and if they can't enjoy it for whatever reason, tough.

[Enemy Of The State]

I know! I have been trying to practice my "concerned face" but I just can't seem to bullshit anyone with it :)

Gee, sooo many of the little suckers hate America so passionately, yet where do they want to come to study? Maybe its because our stinking government gives them more priviledges than they do our own people. Over half of the assistanceships at my university are foreigners.

[TheAngryClam]

I'm particularly a fan of most law schools' LLM programs, which are degrees specifically for foreigners.

Talk about a misallocation of resources.

[BlindedByTruth]

yep,I agree, hey, didn't some of the 09/11 bombers have student visa? We should screen all foreign students and enforce limits after they graduate

[Cindy]

speaking of high school and college...

SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: "HATCH'S EFFORTS FOR CHILDREN OF IMMIGRANTS PRAISED" By Shinika A. Sykes (July 18, 2003)

ARTICLE SNIPPET: "High school counselors and college admissions officers gathering in Salt Lake City expressed support Thursday for proposed federal legislation sponsored by Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch that would allow states to grant in-state college tuition rates to children of undocumented immigrants.
    The Dream Act would repeal a section of the 1996 immigration reform law that prohibits states from considering students whose parents are undocumented as residents of the state in order to receive in-state tuition rates.
    Some 75 members of the National Association for College Admission Counseling are meeting at the Little America Hotel through Sunday. The NACAC's membership is made up of more than 20,000 high school guidance counselors and college admission officers.
    "The Dream Act will provide full access to higher education for young immigrant students who have made high academic performance a part of their effort to achieve the American dream," said Joyce Smith, NACAC executive director.
    Hatch's spokeswoman said the senator plans to reintroduce the measure in the 108th Congress."
   
ARTICLE SNIPPET: "In 2002, Utah legislators passed a law that granted in-state tuition to children of undocumented immigrants who have completed at least three years in Utah high schools. After the Utah measure passed, a legal opinion said Utah schools could begin granting the tuition break even if the federal law had not been repealed."
http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Jul/07182003/utah/76388.asp

[HadEnough]

"These students are anxious and angry with us ... and wow, it's killing us"

This all about GREED. Not only do these selfish pricks NOT care about the foreign students, they care even LESS about the security of the United States. Also keep in mind that at ALL taxpayer supported universities (state), student tuition only pays for a small portion of the operating costs. The local taxpayers foot the remainder of the bill.

These same greedy traitors are also the biggest supporters of criminal alien's attending "their" universities at the same cost as in-state kids of taxpayers. Ooops, I forgot they are really just "undocumented workers".

[Enemy Of The State]

My personal view is that we should limit the subjects foreigners are allowed to study in US universities to those areas of Medicine, Civil Engineering, Non-nuclear sciences, ect...basically, areas which do not teach them to go home and use their knowledge to build nuclear and biological weapons to use against us.

by not doing so, we are only cutting our noses off to spite our faces.

[HadEnough]

My personal view is that they should not be here at all. That solves ALL the aforementioned problems in this post.

America's universities were invaded back in the 1920's and have never really recovered. At least back then, the agents were Communists dispatched by Stalin.

Nowadays, the second generation, American born version controls the universities so it is easy to see why they are in favor of more of the same.

[College Repub]

Who would want a foreign lawyer?

[College Repub]

I just graduated. There were many from India and Saudi Arabia at my university. Most were studying business or engineering. Nearly all of them were VERY wealthy as far as I could tell...

[TheAngryClam]

Most state bars don't accept the LLM as equivalent to the JD in order to sit for the bar.

These degrees are mostly so they can go back to whatever country they were originally a practicing lawyer in and now have studied American law.

So in other words, you support the state schools having these with your taxes, and never see any actual work out of those people.

[austinTparty]

Yep. Don't allow any foreigners to study at U.S. universities. And what's more: Don't allow any Americans to receive any of those stupid Rhodes or Fulbright scholarships. What the hell do they need to learn outside of the US anyway? Isn't their own country good enough?

We don't need professional cooperation in the sciences or medicine or anything else, because nothing good ever came out of a foreign country. Foreign Service officers shouldn't even be required to know a foreign language, let alone a foreign culture, because all they've got to do is telephone from their desks to all those foreign countries and tell those other countries what's what.

Why stop there? No more allowing foreign companies to invest in the United States, because that means we have to let in foreigners--especially engineers and chemists and doctors, because they could learn something that could harm U.S. security. Marriages between U.S. citizens and foreigners should also be null and void--they could just be marrying U.S. citizens to get green cards and learn important state secrets. Time to put up a wall and not let anybody in or out.

Granted, the Soviet sphere tried all this before. But it's different when it's us.

[College Repub]

What does American law matter in any of those countries?

[TheAngryClam]

When you're the world's economic powerhouse that nearly every country on earth sends goods too, and many multinational corporations have operations in, a familiarity with U.S. Customs, Immigration, Taxation, and particularly Contract (since many U.S. firms demand a "choice of law" clause that stipulates American commercial law apply to disputes) law are important fields to be familiar with.

Same reason that having some familiarity with Chinese, Japanese, or EU law is useful for many American attorneys.

[HadEnough]

I totally agree with your proposal, no sarcasm intended.

In fact, I would hope that you would be the first of many to actively demonstrate the feasibility of your proposal!

[austinTparty]

Well, only problem is what would I do with the little half-breeds I already have? Hmm. Perhaps you are an adherent to Peter Sanger's moral philosophy...?

I just wonder which tribe you were born into---Ojibwa, Cherokee, Pueblo?

[HadEnough]

Please take all your half-breeds with you. I am already supporting hundreds, perhaps thousands, of parasite families.

[austinTparty]

Interesting. You are assuming that YOU are supporting ME or MY children? Parasite family? Where in the H-E-double hockey sticks do you get that idea? On a percentage and odds basis, it's very highly likely I pay way more into the system than you do. You are unworthy to lick the dirt from the soles of my children's feet, you smarmy ba$tard.

[austinTparty]

Look here.