UW-Madison is a world-class research institution that prides itself greatly on the diversity of ideas on campus. Students from around the country and around the world come here, and scientific and academic breakthroughs from foreign students are commonplace. In that light, the most recent statistic on international student enrollment is extremely distressing.
Over the past year, UW-Madison has seen an astounding 32 percent decline in applications from foreign students. This decline in enrollment is due in large part to the strict anti-terrorism policies of the Bush administration which have led to extremely great burdens on foreign students attempting to obtain visas. New laws such as the Patriot Act have made the process required to obtain visas much longer and more complex.
The result is that more and more international students are deciding the process for applying to school in the United States is not worth the trouble. \I have been on the [UW-Madison] faculty for 28 years,"" Chancellor John Wiley stated, ""and I've never seen that big a drop [in international student applications] from one year to the next.""
The effects of a decrease in international students are being felt across the country. In an op-ed piece in The New York Times last week, Robert Gates, the current president of Texas A&M University and the director of the Central Intelligence Agency under the first President Bush, noted a similarly alarming drop in enrollment at his institution.
Furthermore, Gates explained, since most international students tend to study science, many young people who could potentially be part of the next generation of top U.S. scientists are studying elsewhere instead.
The result could be a weakened economy due to fewer technological advances in this country, while other countries gain scientific minds. Gates pointed out that, as foreign enrollment in the United States has gone down, Australia has seen a 20 percent increase in university enrollment for Chinese students over the past year.
A diverse campus environment is part of what makes UW-Madison a great institution. We cannot stand by and watch while foreign students continue to choose to study in other countries simply because the visa application process is easier. It is essential to act to keep great minds coming to this and other top universities around the country.
If this issue is important to you, write your U.S. legislator about your concerns. Also, throw your support behind Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., the lone dissenter to the Patriot Act in the Senate, in the coming elections. It is not too late to start attracting brilliant foreign minds to this school and this country once again.
Sam Berns is a junior majoring in political science and religion studies.
