With leases signed, tickets booked, deposits paid, and about a month for schools to reopen, the recent U.S. directive requiring F-1 student visa holders to be on campus this fall has hung a looming cloud of uncertainty over Indian students.

The announcement by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) last week that international students must attend college or university in person — and not solely online — has created panic among international students, said Sudhanshu Kaushik, the founder of the North American Association of Indian Students (NAAIS).

This directive has “completely uprooted financially, socially and even physically” immigrant students from the United States, Kaushik said. With the ruling coming this close to the fall semester, students have paid tuition, some having taken loans for tuition and school costs.

Like American students, many have signed leases for the 2020 academic year.

Kaushik said he feels the U.S. government has “washed their hands” of immigrant students when dealing with the pandemic.

Jaskirat Panjrath, 19, a freshman at the Parsons School of Design in New York, came to the U.S. because the education system here was the best, he said. He has gotten a taste of that education, but as COVID-19 emerged, Panjrath said his reality transformed, he said.

“America is no more the land of dreams or whatever it claims to be,” he added. “There is no coming in here and, like, settling in, you know, trying to work toward the American dream or so.”

“This entire thing's, just caused a lot of anxiety, and added a lot more uncertainty to the uncertainty,” he said. “[It’s] filling this entire bucket of uncertainty and it's like overflowing but like they’re still pouring more uncertainty.”

Panjrath said some of his classmates and colleagues left the U.S. in March, when the COVID pandemic started to shutter campuses and businesses in the U.S., to be with their families. He spent $2,000 to get home to New Delhi, he said.

Some have returned to prepare for fall coursework, he said, paying deposits on or moving into apartments in anticipation of the academic year. Now, he said, they don’t know what the future may hold for them.

“That's so much financial burden on someone who's just like, what 19 right now,” Panjrath said.

Students from India are the second-largest group of international students in the United States. As of 2019, over 200,000 students were in the United States to pursue higher education. Many study science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) programs.

India reported its largest one-day increase of COVID-19 cases – 28,701 – on July 13.

Earlier this year, the U.S. government suspended work visas for internationals -- including the H1-B visas. Many international students stay on a visa track from the F-1 to Optional Practical Training (OPT) after graduation to H1-B work visas and eventually to green cards, or permanent residency.

“We always thought there was another shoe dropping like after the H1-B ruling … but this just seems drastic and cruel,” Bansari Kamdar, a master’s student in applied economics at the University of Massachusetts-Boston.

“If the universities are going to have to keep their doors open that means that there's a greater risk for everyone else to get COVID too, not just international students,” Kamdar said. “I don't think the administration's thinking about students in general.”

Harvard and MIT have filed a lawsuit against the government, asserting that ICE’s ruling has left universities in “the untenable situation” of either largely moving classes online or “to attempt, with just weeks before classes resume, to provide in-person education.” Universities including Brown, Yale, Northwestern, and others have also filed an amicus brief supporting the lawsuit.

Some universities are providing a hybrid curriculum with some online and some in-person classes to meet the requirement.

Sixty percent say they are planning for an in-person semester, according to the Chronicle for Higher Education, which since March has been tracking which colleges and universities will teach online, in person or a hybrid of both.

An additional 24% say they are planning a hybrid model (part in class, part online), and 7.2% are undecided or undeclared.

Nine percent of 1,090 U.S. universities are planning for a fall semester exclusively online.

The continual growth of international students studying in the United States contributed $41 billion and supported 458,290 jobs to the U.S. economy during the 2018-2019 academic year, according to NAFSA.

The United States hit an all-time high of 1,095,299 international students, mostly from China, in 2019, according to the Institute of International Education. But the rate of growth showed flattening for two years prior.

The administration of President Donald Trump said on Monday it will review Columbia University's federal contracts and grants over allegations of antisemitism, which it says the educational institution has shown inaction in tackling.

Rights advocates note rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias since U.S. ally Israel's devastating military assault on Gaza began after Palestinian Hamas militants' deadly October 2023 attack.

The Justice Department said a month ago it formed a task force to fight antisemitism. The U.S. Departments of Health and Education and the General Services Administration jointly made the review announcement on Monday.

"The Federal Government's Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is considering Stop Work Orders for $51.4 million in contracts between Columbia University and the Federal Government," the joint statement said.

The agencies said no contracting actions had been taken yet.

"The task force will also conduct a comprehensive review of the more than $5 billion in federal grant commitments to Columbia University."

The agencies did not respond to requests for comment on whether there were similar reviews over allegations of Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias.

Columbia had no immediate comment. It previously said it made efforts to tackle antisemitism.

College protests

Trump has signed an executive order to combat antisemitism and pledged to deport non-citizen college students and others who took part in pro-Palestinian protests.

Columbia was at the center of college protests in which demonstrators demanded an end to U.S. support for Israel due to the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel's assault on Gaza. There were allegations of antisemitism and Islamophobia in protests and counter-protests.

During last summer's demonstrations around the country, classes were canceled, some university administrators resigned and student protesters were suspended and arrested.

While the intensity of protests has decreased in recent months, there were some demonstrations last week in New York after the expulsion of two students at Columbia University-affiliated Barnard College and after New York Governor Kathy Hochul ordered the removal of a Palestinian studies job listing at Hunter College.

A third student at Barnard College has since been expelled, this one related to the occupation of the Hamilton Hall building at Columbia last year.

The Trump administration is opening new investigations into allegations of antisemitism at five U.S. universities including Columbia and the University of California, Berkeley, the Education Department announced Monday.

It's part of President Donald Trump's promise to take a tougher stance against campus antisemitism and deal out harsher penalties than the Biden administration, which settled a flurry of cases with universities in its final weeks. It comes the same day the Justice Department announced a new task force to root out antisemitism on college campuses.

In an order signed last week, Trump called for aggressive action to fight anti-Jewish bias on campuses, including the deportation of foreign students who have participated in pro-Palestinian protests.

Along with Columbia and Berkeley, the department is now investigating the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University and Portland State University. The cases were opened using the department's power to launch its own civil rights reviews, unlike the majority of investigations, which stem from complaints.

Messages seeking comment were left with all five universities.
A statement from the Education Department criticized colleges for tolerating antisemitism after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel and a wave of pro-Palestinian protests that followed. It also criticized the Biden administration for negotiating "toothless" resolutions that failed to hold schools accountable.

"Today, the Department is putting universities, colleges, and K-12 schools on notice: this administration will not tolerate continued institutional indifference to the wellbeing of Jewish students on American campuses," said Craig Trainor, the agency's acting assistant secretary for civil rights.

The department didn't provide details about the inquiries or how it decided which schools are being targeted. Presidents of Columbia and Northwestern were among those called to testify on Capitol Hill last year as Republicans sought accountability for allegations of antisemitism. The hearings contributed to the resignation of multiple university presidents, including Columbia's Minouche Shafik.

An October report from House Republicans accused Columbia of failing to punish pro-Palestinian students who took over a campus building, and it called Northwestern's negotiations with student protesters a "stunning capitulation."

House Republicans applauded the new investigations. Representative Tim Walberg, chair of the Education and Workforce Committee, said he was "glad that we finally have an administration who is taking action to protect Jewish students."

Trump's order also calls for a full review of antisemitism complaints filed with the Education Department since Oct. 7, 2023, including pending and resolved cases from the Biden administration. It encourages the Justice Department to take action to enforce civil rights laws.

Last week's order drew backlash from civil rights groups who said it violated First Amendment rights that protect political speech.

The new task force announced Monday includes the Justice and Education departments along with Health and Human Services.

"The Department takes seriously our responsibility to eradicate this hatred wherever it is found," said Leo Terrell, assistant attorney general for civil rights. "The Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is the first step in giving life to President Trump's renewed commitment to ending anti-Semitism in our schools."

The Times of India breaks down the most popular subjects for international students to study in the U.S.

STEM and business lead the pack. Read the full story here. (January 2025)

U.S. News & World report addresses some of the misconceptions about U.S. colleges and universities, including the difficulty of getting a visa.

Read the full story here. (January 2025)