A survey showing the enrollment of new international students declined by 43% in Fall 2020 underestimates the depth of the problems U.S. universities must confront. Most of the drop is due to Covid-19, and the coronavirus pandemic will continue in 2021. Equally pressing, a series of Trump administration policies have made a U.S. education much less attractive to international students. A new plan for international education and employment-based immigration can reverse the trend, according to universities.
The number of Indian students in the United States dropped 4.4 percent in 2019-20, the worst drop in over a decade, according to initial data released on a study funded by the U.S. government. Covid-19 is likely to drag those figures down even further, with new international student enrolment in American universities crashing 42 percent in fall 2020. However, 90 percent of institutions reported that students have delayed enrolment by a year, meaning that many may be hoping to resume their plans to study in the U.S. next year.
Key findings of Open Doors 2020, an annual survey conducted by the International Institute of Education in partnership with the U.S. State Department, showed that 18 percent of the one million international students in the U.S. are from India. Only China, with 35 percent, holds a bigger share of the international population in American institutions.
