Student Union
- By Rick Ruggles
COVID-19 Limits Foreign Student Enrollment
International students bring a wealth of diversity and a healthy chunk of money to many American colleges and universities.
But the flow of international students to the U.S. will most likely decrease in the fall. The coronavirus has hit the U.S. hard and may dissuade some international students from coming. Challenges and delays in obtaining visas to America, and in getting flights here, threaten the enrollment of some.
Trade conflicts and other tensions between the U.S. and some nations, particularly China, the biggest source of international students, might play into some students' decisions. Further, the number of international students enrolled in American colleges has already dropped over the past couple of years.
"There are just so many things out of our control," said Lina Stover, undergraduate admissions director at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
Coronavirus crisis
Sue Zhang, a Chinese student who will graduate from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln this month, has decided to go to graduate school at UNL as well. But Zhang, who has majored in civil engineering and math, told the Omaha World-Herald she expects the coronavirus crisis to cut into UNL's international student enrollment.
Worry about getting COVID-19 compelled her to stay put at UNL. She had hoped to visit other graduate schools this spring, such as Stanford University and the University of California-Davis, but she didn't want to fly while the country was intensely affected by the virus.
"I think the university is doing everything they can," said Zhang, who moved with some other international students into UNL's Eastside Suites residence hall when the crisis closed many dorms.
A UNL professor in civil engineering, Dave Admiraal, said Zhang has a passion for learning and the ability to pick up new things quickly. "I have learned so much from them (international students) beyond what I would have learned had I only been exposed to students from the U.S.," he said in an email.
Zhang plans to start working on a master's degree in water resource engineering this summer. As for trade tensions and other conflicts between the U.S. and China, she said they aren't vital to her. "I'm just not that into politics," she said.
Declining student population
Last fall, UNL's international student population fell from 2,807 to 2,560, according to the UNL Factbook, an 8.8 percent decline. The coronavirus crisis may affect all universities' enrollments in the fall, said Josh Davis, UNL's associate vice chancellor for global affairs. It's too early to say how much, he said.
"International students really add so much to our campus and our community," Davis said. They enrich a campus's diversity and have become a key source of revenue to American colleges over the past 10 years. At UNL and Iowa State, they make up close to 10 percent of the enrollment, and many of them pay full out-of-state tuition.
Davis said UNL wants to stay in touch with international students who have stayed on campus or gone home. UNL holds virtual coffee talks, he said, and held a virtual karaoke night this semester. The students "are looking for the signal and message that they're welcome here," he said.
If visa challenges mean that some international students can't get back to Lincoln until the middle of the fall semester, Davis said, UNL will work with them.
'Three-plus years of rhetoric'
Grant De Roo, a higher education consultant in Iowa City, said "three-plus years of rhetoric that paints other countries as antagonists to the United States" has hurt international enrollment. President Donald Trump's talk about sealing borders, American nationalism and a travel ban for some nations give the U.S. an unfriendly image, he said.
"I think it's really fundamentally changing the way international students view the United States," he said.
Ryan Hamilton, executive director of the Nebraska Republican Party, disagrees. Trump insists that allies fulfill their financial obligations to international organizations like NATO and that Mexico strengthen its border, Hamilton said.
If those expectations make the U.S. seem less friendly and unwilling to be taken advantage of, "most Americans are prepared to accept" the consequences, he said.
Edna Chun, chief learning officer at the consulting firm HigherEd Talent, said delays in obtaining visas could make it difficult for some international students to come to the U.S. Greater scrutiny of visas is also a concern.
Chun cited a Palestinian student from Lebanon who enrolled at Harvard University last year. Immigration officials in Boston sent the student back to Lebanon when they found anti-American political messages from his friends on a laptop, according to multiple news accounts. The young man was ultimately allowed in.
The University of Nebraska at Kearney saw a slight decline in international students last year. Tim Burkink, UNK's assistant vice chancellor for international affairs, said he and his staff hope to retain many of their existing international students, about three-fourths of whom remain in Kearney.
Visa hangups "would probably be the biggest barrier" to coming to UNK, he said. Staff shortages at U.S. consulates and embassies in other nations -- American staffers have been brought back during the pandemic -- contribute to visa problems.
Burkink nevertheless said he is optimistic that the number of international students at UNK will be flat or only slightly down.
De Roo said competition for those students has increased in recent years. English-language nations such as Canada, Great Britain and Australia have upped their higher ed games to provide good degree programs for international students, he said.
Not everyone saw a decline last year. Wayne State College said its global enrollment increased last fall to 82 from 38. UNO's rose from 845 to 876.
Sue Zhang, who plans to be an engineer, said her parents hope that she will eventually return to China. Their wishes are a major consideration, she said.
But she could also imagine getting a job in the U.S. or getting married and staying here. "I was kind of thinking about it," she said. "Who will know what will happen later?"
This story was written by Rick Ruggles of Omaha World-Herald for the Associated Press.
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Lily Meskers faced an unexpected choice in the lead-up to the first major election she can vote in.
The 19-year-old University of Montana sprinter was among college athletes in the state who received an inquiry from Montana Together asking if she was interested in a name, image and likeness deal to support Sen. Jon Tester, a three-term Democrat seeking re-election. The group, which is not affiliated with the Tester campaign, offered from $400 to $2,400 to athletes willing to produce video endorsements.
Meskers, who is from Colorado but registered to vote in Montana, decided against the deal because she disagrees with Tester's votes on legislation involving transgender athletes in sports.
"I was like, OK, I believe that this is a political move to try to gain back some voters that he might have lost," Meskers said. "And me being a female student-athlete myself, I was not going to give my endorsement to someone who I felt didn't have the same support for me."
Professional athletes such as LeBron James, Colin Kaepernick and Stephen Curry have taken high-profile stances on hot-button topics and political campaigns in recent years, but college athletes are far less outspoken — even if money is available, according to experts in the NIL field. Being outwardly political can reflect on their school or endanger potential endorsement deals from brands that don't want controversy. It can certainly establish a public image for an athlete — for better or for worse — or lead to tensions with teammates and coaches who might not feel the same way.
There are examples of political activism by college athletes: A Texas Tech kicker revealed his support for former President Donald Trump on a shirt under his uniform at a game last week and a handful of Nebraska athletes a few days ago teamed up in a campaign ad against an abortion measure on the Tuesday's ballot.
Still, such steps are considered rare.
"It can be viewed as risky and there may be people telling them just don't even take that chance because they haven't made it yet," said Lauren Walsh, who started a sports branding agency 15 years ago. She said there is often too much to lose for themselves, their handlers and in some cases, their families.
"And these individuals still have to figure out what they're going to do with the rest of their lives, even those that do end up getting drafted," she added.
College coaches are not always as reticent. Auburn men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl has used social media to make it clear he does not support Kamala Harris, Trump's Democratic opponent in next week's presidential election. Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy once caused a stir with a star player for wearing a shirt promoting a far-right news outlet.
Blake Lawrence, co-founder of the NIL platform Opendorse, noted that this is the first presidential election in the NIL era, which began in July 2021. He said athletes are flocking to opportunities to help increase voter turnout in the 18-to-24 age demographic, adding that one of his company's partners has had 86 athletes post social media messages encouraging turnout through the first half of the week.
He said athletes are shying away from endorsing specific candidates or causes that are considered partisan.
"Student-athletes are, for the most part, still developing their confidence in endorsing any type of product or service," he said. "So if they are hesitant to put their weight behind supporting a local restaurant or an e-commerce product, then they are certainly going to be hesitant to use their social channels in a political way."
Giving athletes a voice
Many college athletes have opted to focus on drumming up turnout in a non-partisan manner or simply using their platforms to take stands that are not directly political in nature. Some of those efforts can be found in battleground states.
A progressive group called NextGen America said it had signed players in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Virginia to encourage voting among young people. Another organization, The Team, said it prepped 27 college athletes in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona and Michigan to lead volunteer voter participation opportunities for students. The organization also said it got more than 625 coaches to sign a nonpartisan pledge to get their athletes registered to vote.
The Team's executive director is Joe Kennedy, a former coach who coordinated championship visits and other sporting events at the White House during President Barack Obama's administration. In early October, it hosted a Zoom event during which panelists such as NCAA President Charlie Baker and WNBA players Nneka Ogwumike and Natasha Cloud gave college athletes advice about using their platforms on campus.
In its early days, The Team seized upon momentum from the record turnout seen in the 2020 election. The NCAA that year said Division I athletes could have Election Day off from practice and play to vote. Lisa Kay Solomon, founder of the All Vote No Play campaign, said even if the athletes don't immediately take stands on controversial issues, it's important for them to learn how.
"It is a lot to ask our young people to feel capable and confident on skills they've never had a chance to practice," Solomon said. "We have to model what it means to practice taking risks, practice standing up for yourself, practice pausing to think about what are the values that you care about — not what social media is feeding into your brain, but what do you care about and how do you express that? And how do you do it in a way that honors the kind of future that you want to be a part of?"
Shut up and play?
Two years ago, Tennessee-Martin quarterback Dresser Winn said he would support a candidate in a local district attorney general race in what experts said was very likely the first political NIL deal by a college athlete.
There have been very few since.
The public criticism and fallout for athletes who speak out on politics or social issue can be sharp. Kaepernick, the Super Bowl-winning quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, hasn't played in an NFL game since January 2017, not long after he began kneeling during the national anthem at games.
Meskers, the Montana sprinter, said political endorsements through NIL deals could create problems for athletes and their schools.
"I just think that NIL is going to run into a lot of trouble and a lot of struggles if they continue to let athletes do political endorsements," she said. "I just think it's messy. But I stand by NIL as a whole. I think it's really hard as a student athlete to create a financial income and support yourself."
Walsh said it's easier for wealthy and veteran stars like James and Ogwumike to take stands. James, the Los Angeles Lakers star, started More Than a Vote — an organization with a mission to "educate, energize and protect Black voters" — in 2020. He has passed the leadership to Ogwumike, who just finished her 13th year in the WNBA and also is the president of the Women's National Basketball Players Association. More than a Vote is focused on women's rights and reproductive freedom this year.
"They have very established brands," Walsh said. "They know who they are and they know what their political stance is. They know that they have a really strong following that -- there's always going to be haters, but they're also always going to have that strong following of people who listen to everything that they have to say."
Andra Gillespie, an associate professor at Emory University who teaches African American politics, also said it is rare that a college athlete would make a significant impact with a political stand simply because they tend to have a more regional platform than national. Even celebrities like Taylor Swift and Eminem are better at increasing turnout than championing candidates.
"They are certainly very beneficial in helping to drive up turnout among their fans," Gillespie said. "The data is less conclusive about whether or not they're persuasive – are they the ones who are going to persuade you to vote for a particular candidate?"
Athletes as influencers
Still, campaigns know young voters are critical this election cycle, and athletes offer an effective and familiar voice to reach them.
Political and social topics are not often broached, but this week six Nebraska athletes — five softball players and a volleyball player — appeared in an ad paid for by the group Protect Women and Children involving two initiatives about abortion laws on Tuesday's ballot.
The female athletes backed Initiative 434, which would amend the state constitution to prohibit abortions after the first trimester, with exceptions. Star softball player Jordy Bahl said on social media that the athletes were not paid.
A University of Montana spokesperson said two athletes initially agreed to take part in the NIL deal backing Tester. The school said one withdrew and the other declined to be interviewed.
For Meskers, deciding against the offer boiled down to Tester twice voting against proposals to bar federal funds from going to schools that allow transgender athletes to play women's sports, a prominent GOP campaign topic. Tester's campaign said the proposals were amendments to government spending packages, and he didn't want to play a role in derailing them as government shutdowns loomed.
"As a former public school teacher and school board member, Jon Tester believes these decisions should be made at the local level," a Tester spokesperson said. "He has never voted to allow men to compete against women."
Meskers said she believes using influence as college athletes is good and she is in favor of NIL. She just doesn't think the two should mix specifically for supporting candidates.
"I think especially as student athletes, we do have such a big voice and we do have a platform to use," she said. "So I think if you're encouraging people to do their civic duties and get up and go (vote), I think that's a great thing."
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