Harvard President Wants Biden to Expand Visas for Foreign Students

Harvard President Wants Biden to Expand Visas for Foreign Students

What Harvard does today, other schools do tomorrow. Expect this to be echoed by other higher ed administrations.

Campus Reform reports:

Harvard president asks Biden to ‘act without delay’ in expanding visas for foreign students

Harvard University President Lawrence Bacow asked President-elect Joe Biden to “act without delay” in allowing foreign students to return to the United States.

“As January approaches and COVID rates rise, many colleges and universities must continue to accommodate remote learning and research for the spring semester,” said Bacow in a letter to Biden. “I hope you will act without delay in your first days in office to instruct the Student Exchange Visa Program to provide guidance clarifying that continuing students will be able to maintain their status by enrolling in a full-time course of study through distance learning and, most critically, extending that flexibility to new students for the duration of the pandemic.”

As Campus Reform reported in July, the Trump administration’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program announced that students taking a fully online course load during the fall 2020 semester would have to return to their home countries due to COVID-related travel considerations. However, the SEVP reversed its decision after backlash from several American universities, preventing only students not yet in the U.S. from traveling here.

Bacow criticized other aspects of the Trump administration’s actions with respect to immigration.

“Over the past four years, executive orders and presidential proclamations have barred entry to many, with others beset by processing delays, backlogs, and administrative hurdles designed to frustrate access to opportunities in this country.”

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