International students and researchers at the University of Missouri are concerned about the long-term impacts of the pending federal visa rule, which could potentially change how long they can study at colleges in the United States.
The potential implementation of the Department of Homeland Security’s rule has raised concerns among the roughly 1,600 international students at Mizzou, many of whom are pursuing graduate degrees, according to International Programs data.
The rule was initially filed on July 17, and more than 22,000 public responses were recorded. Since Sept. 14, the federal ruling has been on hold due to a preliminary injunction, and the next meeting has not been scheduled.
A Mizzou Ph.D. student, who asked to remain anonymous due to sensitivity on the topic, noted the concerns they saw across a majority of the international student body, as many have pending status for green cards. The student explained that while graduate students may be in their last semester, their research is not always complete.
Green card applications also take a long time, averaging several years to approve, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
“For a Ph.D. student, it’s not a certain period of time for how long the research takes, collecting data, doing research or publishing papers — of course it takes longer than four years,” they said. “With this rule, it means that if you are not done in four years, we have to leave the country without getting our degree or pursuing the goal that we were here for.”
If a student hopes to earn an additional degree beyond the one they first applied for or simply needs more time than expected to finish their program, they will need to apply for an Extension of Stay through U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services before their authorized stay ends.
As a result, pursuing graduate degrees is much more difficult.
Under the new rule, the 60-day buffer period both before and after a student’s authorized stay is also halved. The criteria for an extension are strict, as retaking a course or poor academic performance alone are not considered valid reasons.
An international researcher at Mizzou, who asked to remain anonymous for safety, also voiced further concerns with what rules like these could imply for the future.
“If they are going at F-1 international students at this angle, potentially, they could come at it from another angle, and they have. So I was concerned that this was a prelude to larger, more impactful action,” they said.
The researcher continued emphasizing the issue of changing rules while students are already enrolled in the system.
“It does not help our predicament when the rules change while we are presented with the prior expectation that the rules were set in stone in a certain way,” they said. “Now we have to adjust and accommodate.”
In August, eight organizations that represented both higher education and journalism filed a lawsuit, including the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, the Association of International Educators and American Federation of Teachers. The group argued that DHS did not comply with various parts of the Administrative Procedure Act.
The rule was initially set to take effect on Sept. 15, but a preliminary injunction from a federal judge delayed it a day before.
Shortly before the Oct. 2 status conference, where the court met to discuss how the hearing should proceed, DHS filed an appeal of the injunction.
“They are creating problems for themselves in the end because things like this, without having gone through the rulemaking process in good faith, without having done the necessary cost benefit analysis, addressing people’s criticisms, all those kinds of things, you will be challenged in court and you will lose,” the researcher said.
The university has not made a public statement on this issue to date, emphasizing that they will not comment on pending litigation.
“This is not fair. We are students,” the Ph.D. student said. “We come here to do research, for study and for improvement. The government should help us to do this instead of stopping us.”
