Student Union
For Some Universities, Fall Semester Uncertain as Coronavirus Persists Globally
The U.S. government’s pumping of $35 billion into emergency aid for college students has not been enough for some universities, say education experts.
They cite drastically lower enrollments even as things appear to be shifting back to normal after more than a year of the coronavirus pandemic.
“Enrollments are down quite significantly, both at the public institutions and the community colleges, nationwide,” said Todd Sedmak, manager of corporate communications at National Student Clearinghouse (NSC), a nonprofit organization that crunches education data.
“This decrease in enrollment has led to less money coming to universities from tuition and fees,” he said.
Declines in enrollment occurred because of the coronavirus pandemic, which shut down campuses in March 2020. Students switched to remote learning, while others deferred enrollment: Online learning, coupled with the cost of college — was not worth it for many students.
Among international students, enrollment decreased 43% for the fall 2020 semester, according to the Institute of International Education (IIE). Among American students, enrollments declined 2.5% in fall 2020, nearly twice the rate of enrollment decline reported in fall 2019, NSC reported.
The fiscal contribution from international students to the U.S. economy in the 2019-2020 academic year was $38.7 billion, down $1.8 billion (4.4%), Rachel Banks, senior director of public policy and legislation at NAFSA: Association of International Educators, wrote in an email to VOA.
The savings from colleges and universities not operating study abroad programs during the pandemic partially offset the financial loss of fewer enrollments, said Catharine Hill, managing director of Ithaka S+R, an organization looking to broaden access to higher education and reduce costs.
But overall, said Lynn Pasquerella, president of American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U), the pandemic’s economic toll on U.S. universities and colleges has been huge.
Some colleges have closed, unable to weather the economic storm. Banks pointed to Becker College in Massachusetts, Mills College in California, and Concordia College in New York as examples, writing that they “have had to shut their doors because the pandemic exacerbated their existing financial troubles.”
As for students who suddenly find themselves without a college or university to attend, Federal Student Aid (FSA), an office of the U.S. Department of Education, lists options.
Students may transfer to another university to finish their program of study. Some closing institutions offer what is called a teach out, which is a specific contract with another institution for students to fulfill their studies to graduate.
Concordia College in Bronxville, New York, agreed to a formal agreement with nearby Iona College in New Rochelle, New York, to provide continued education for Concordia’s students. Iona will purchase Concordia’s leafy Bronxville campus.
Graduating international students at Concordia who hold F-1 student visas will be protected by a transfer of records to Concordia University in St. Paul, Minnesota, according to the university website. The university will be a custodian of the student’s records, allowing the Designated School Official (DSO) there to manage students who have been approved for Optional Practical Training (OPT), a popular work-permit program for international students.
For U.S. citizens who decide not to continue their education immediately, they can try to discharge their federal student loans, meaning some or all of the money is not repaid.
For international students, school closures could threaten their visa status. Students are encouraged to speak to their school’s designated official for the Department of Homeland Security’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP).
According to U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, schools will retain access to the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) to transfer and maintain student records until a date set by SEVP, upon which SEVP will terminate the student’s SEVIS records.
Active nonimmigrant students or students in initial status who have already entered the U.S. after being cleared to do so can transfer to another SEVP-certified institution, change their visa status or leave the country, according to ICE.
In terms of what the fall semester will look like for international students in the U.S., Ithaka S+R’s Hill said uncertainty still exists.
“I think there'll still be some problems with international students just because other countries are not getting vaccinated as quickly,” she said. “So, I'm not quite sure what they'll do there ... have a negative test before they leave, bring them back, have them quarantine for two weeks, and then get the vaccine.”
Hill also said she hoped domestic students “can come back.”
Pasquerella acknowledged that in addition to the schools of higher learning, students have had to face hardships during the pandemic.
“For decades, we've been talking about how the current financial model for higher education is unsustainable; we can't continue to have increasing tuition, burgeoning loan burdens for students, especially at a time when job prospects for college graduates are uncertain,” she said.
To best help students, Pasquerella said, reinvestment in higher education is needed. That way, she said, it would be seen as a public good, rather than a private commodity. Hill noted that the Biden administration’s proposal to double the Pell Grant would be helpful.
A federal Pell Grant does not have to be repaid. The maximum Pell Grant for 2015–2016 was $5,775. The amount depends on the costs to attend school, a person’s financial need, status as a full- or part-time student, and plans to attend school for a full academic year or less, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
Hill said she is still worried about the pandemic’s effect on lower-income students.
“I do worry that low-income families have been so disrupted that getting students to college — I mean, even if the economy comes back, if you've been out of the labor market for a year, [it] takes a little longer to recover from that,” she told VOA.
“The higher your income, the more likely that you actually still had some in-person classes or effective synchronous online classes,” Hill said. “And the lower your income, the more likely that you've just missed out on a good part of your high school education. And that's going to put students in a very different position when it's time to go to college.”
While the coronavirus and its variants remain global, Banks said enrollment was up from last year’s significant losses.
The Common App, a standardized application to colleges and universities, showed that as of February 15, the volume of international applicants to U.S. colleges and universities for Fall 2021 had increased by about 13% over the prior year.
The countries that send the most students are showing increases, Banks said, with the exception of China.
“Although applications from China are down by 18% from last year, there are large increases in applicants from other countries including India (+28%), Canada (+22%), Nigeria (+12%), Pakistan (+37%), the United Kingdom (+23%), and Brazil (+41%),” she wrote.
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College athletes push for voter turnout while largely avoiding controversy as election nears
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."
