Higher education leaders fear repercussions from Trump administration policies could threaten the country’s standing as a top destination for international students, leading to a boycott that would hit their finances and campus culture at a time when many schools are already struggling financially.
Grants for scientific research have been eliminated without warning. Universities are laying off workers, closing labs, and cutting budgets. And now federal agents are trying to deport international students who have expressed support for Palestinians, further jeopardizing the ability of higher education institutions to recruit and retain talented students from around the world.
“A lot of people are averse to come and do their education in America, because they realize that if they come here, they’re going to basically have stones thrown at them their entire time here,” said Kwame Asare, an 18-year-old freshman at Tufts who is originally from Ghana and holds US citizenship. “Even if they’re contributing to the economy or to the general greatness of America, they’re still going to be treated as they don’t belong here.”
In a college-rich environment like the Boston area, foreign students are a vital source of money and intellectual energy; at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology alone, 40 percent of graduate students are here on student visas from other countries.
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And, because they do not qualify for federal financial aid, foreign students often pay the full cost of tuition, providing a critical source of revenue for schools at a time when they are under pressure to provide more financial aid to US students because of the high cost of tuition. So, even a modest decline in foreign enrollment would be a devastating hit to some schools, compounding the financial damage they’re facing from the Trump administration’s cuts to federal research funding and proposals to dramatically increase the tax on endowment earnings.
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International students make up about 6 percent of the total US college student population, according to the Department of Commerce, and contributed more than $50 billion to the nation’s economy in 2023. About half study STEM-related fields.
Massachusetts, because of the strength of its higher education sector, enjoys an outsize share of that business; more than 82,000 foreign students study on the state’s campuses, contributing nearly $4 billion to the state’s economy, according to the International Educational Exchange, a Washington, D.C.-based group that has conducted an annual census of international students in the United States since 1919.
Foreign students make up about 25 percent of total enrollment at Brandeis, 27 percent at Harvard, 29 percent at Boston University, and 38 percent at Northeastern.
While the bulk of recruitment for the incoming class of 2029 occurred before President Trump took office, professors and administrators worry drawing students here will get markedly more difficult, and some international students, especially aspiring scientists, could choose to study in other countries in the fall.
“The total disaster scenario is really on the table,” said Brendan Cantwell, professor of education at Michigan State University. “The financial strain there is a big deal. And I worry about the capacity to have discussions and to learn from people from around the world.”
Enrollment of new international students declined by about 8 percent between 2016 and 2019 during the first Trump term, according to data from IEE, largely due to visa restrictions and heightened screening processes by the federal government.
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And, the recent arrest and detainment of several international students and at least one faculty member represent a new level of risk. Rumeysa Ozturk, the Tufts graduate student who was whisked off a Somerville street Tuesday, was sent to Louisiana by federal immigration agents before a judge could intervene.
“The biggest threat at this point is the families’ loss of confidence that their children will be safe in this country and not subject to arbitrary search and seizure, deportations, stops at the border,” said Marjorie Hass, president of the Council of Independent Colleges in Washington, D.C.
Uncertainty surrounding federal research funding is already having an impact on university finances, which by itself could be another deterrent for foreign scholars. The University of Massachusetts’ medical school recently rescinded admissions offers to dozens of Ph.D. candidates following Trump’s early moves to slash billions of dollars of federal funding.
“Many of the students who come to the United States are interested in studying science and technology because of what has been our dominance in those areas,” Hass said. “As funding in those programs is cut arbitrarily, there is less to draw in students. They will follow where there is research capacity and find places investing in research rather than cutting their investment.”
Governor Maura Healey has expressed concern about foreign governments recruiting talented scientists and researchers from Massachusetts’ institutions. And Mike Malone, the top research administrator at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has said representatives of China have sought to recruit UMass researchers.
“It doesn’t take much, especially for the most talented students and faculty, to find other places to go,” said Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education in Washington, D.C., which represents about 1,600 colleges and universities.
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The first goal is to retain the students who are already here, college leaders said. Kalpen Trivedi, vice provost for global affairs at UMass Amherst, said his team has met with international students and hosted listening sessions to “reassure them that as and when there are things that affect their presence in this country or the legal status in this country, we will be there to provide solutions for them, to provide information for them, and to work with them on any situations that may arise.”
The university recently advised students to “very carefully assess whether non-critical travel outside the U.S. is necessary at this time,” and renewed a fund to help students, staff, and faculty affected by immigration changes.
Trivedi said UMass Amherst hasn’t had any foreign students revoke their acceptances because immigration policy changes. One colleague recently returned from a recruitment trip to India and reported “a high degree of enthusiasm and optimism among the students and their families about coming to UMass, which we find very encouraging,” Trivedi said.
Still, there is enormous uncertainty about potential travel bans, delays in visas, and further cuts to research funding — not to mention more detentions.
Steven DiSalvo, president of Endicott College in Beverly, where about 5 percent of the school’s students are international, said they are an important “part of the overall growth strategy” for the school, which owns and operates a campus in Madrid.
“The problem is the rules of the game keep changing, so it’s hard to predict how we’re going to respond,” he said.
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Hilary Burns can be reached at hilary.burns@globe.com. Follow her @Hilarysburns. Camilo Fonseca can be reached at camilo.fonseca@globe.com. Follow him on X @fonseca_esq and on Instagram @camilo_fonseca.reports.