Stop Conflating Elite Schools with All Schools!
A plea to the mass media and anyone else who is guilty.
Over the weekend, I noted this guest essay at the NYT by Princeton historian David A. Bell: Are International Students Good for American Universities? The bulk of the piece echoes things that I have said myself on multiple occasions. He notes the general mission of colleges and universities, the economic advantage of international students, and the enhancement of American soft power, for example.
And then he gets to this.
But if we think of universities as engines of social mobility and promoters of national unity, the story looks different. Many of the most elite American universities have not raised their overall enrollments significantly since the 1970s, even as the U.S. population has risen by 50 percent, making admissions far more competitive. The more slots that go to foreigners, the more challenging the process for homegrown applicants.
He then goes on to elaborate a bit on this issue.
But this is not a good answer to the question “Are International Students Good for American Universities?”
It may be that there is a discussion to be had about the enrollment sizes at Harvard or Princeton. Maybe there is a conversation to be had about the percentage of international students at those schools. But those are complex and nuanced discussions that are not being fostered by the Trump administration’s blanket attack on international students.
Bell is, in my view, being a bit myopic from his office at Princeton. But worse, the NYT and its ilk constantly publish op/eds about higher education that almost always come from the POV of the most elite schools.
There are over 2,000 4-year colleges or universities in the United States. Of those, there are the elite Ivies, some other elite private schools, and a number of elite public flagships; there are also a huge number of schools, indeed the vast majority, that do not fall in this camp. And yet, it often feels like the NYT has only heard of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, with Stanford occasionally tossed in for regional diversity.
There are debates to be had about the role of the most elite schools in our social, economic, and political lives. But if we are going to talk about higher ed in a general sense, we need to understand that “higher ed” is not just The Most Elite Schools + The AP Top 25 in Football (or, really, the Top 10).*
According to the IIE’s annual Open Doors report (I guess we need to change the name under the current administration) from last November, there were over 1.1 million international students in the US, scattered across the country. If you want to look at individual state summary sheets, you will note that even with just the top schools listed, we are not talking about solely elite schools.
I would note that due to the tyranny of the alphabet, Alabama is the one that pops up first. I would further note that the third school listed is Auburn University Montgomery, and the fourth is the University of North Alabama. Neither is an elite institution, and both, especially AUM, are likely to be suffering in the Fall from the Trump administration’s policies towards student visas, as well as the general atmosphere of fear and uncertainty surrounding being an international student in the US. As a percentage of the overall AUM enrollment, that international student number is quite significant.
You can note, too, the projected economic impact by state of these students.
So, sure, we can have conversations about Harvard and friends, but please, please, please stop writing about them as if they are at all representative of higher education.
Back to the column:
Furthermore, while foreign students bring one sort of diversity to U.S. universities, it may not be as great as the diversity provided by Americans of different social backgrounds. A graduate of an elite private school in Greece or India may well have more in common with a graduate of Exeter or Horace Mann than with a working-class American from rural Alabama. Do we need to turn university economics departments into mini-Davoses in which future officials of the International Monetary Fund from different countries reinforce each other’s opinions about global trade?
This may well be true. But it has precious little to do with the Trump administration’s attack on foreigners in general, nor on student visas in particular.
I continue to think that the answer to the essay’s title, “Are International Students Good for American Universities?” is “yes!” This is the time to focus on the general attacks on higher education and on foreigners, and we can worry about whether the elites of the elites need to tweak themselves at some point in the future.
*i.e., “Schools I’ve heard of.”
Yup
Couldn’t agree more. I think there really are some parts of some schools that try to live up to the stereotypes that conservatives claim regarding being liberal outposts. However, the huge majority of universities are just teaching kids and there isn’t much of an agenda. Most of the kids come from truly middle class backgrounds. They arent especially woke and they either dont have DEI programs or it’s just a committee run by people who have other jobs. Setting policy that will harm those bread and butter schools to try to make a point about a few elite schools you dont like is stupid. Probably illegal too.
Steve
Great post. Also it’s important to bring in the economic angle of this for those not familiar with college admissions and funding. The idea that international students are “taking seats” away from residents is often–if not almost always–untrue (or perhaps more accurately a half-truth).
The majority of internal students–especially at the undergraduate level and the masters* level–are paying** full tuition. They are essentially revenue generators for colleges and universities and are, to some extent, factored into admission numbers. Essentially, seats are reserved for them.
Further, especially with State schools, those out-of-state, full-tuition students help subsidize in-state students. Having foreign students makes it EASIER for resident students to attend college. Depressing their enrollment, for whatever reason, will hurt US students, not help them.
* – Most terminal masters programs (versus PhD programs) are revenue generators for most schools. MBA’s are a great example of this. However in recent decades, more and more money-making liberal arts MA’s–including the one I earned–have popped up.
** – Note that international students are often financed by entities within their home countries, rather than their immediate families. For example, the vocational program I was a visiting instructor at had a few Saudi students each year who were on a full ride from Aramco. Honestly, those international students helped keep the program alive.
@steve:
Two acquaintances on the faculties of 4-year schools in red states tell the same story. Yes, DEI was active at those schools before the state legislatures forbade it. Then it turned out that the large majority of the people served by DEI were white rural first-in-family students who needed considerable support on how to deal with college. And those students’ MAGA parents were pissed that the support had been cut off.
A dirty little secret here in Cow Hampshire is that the university system and the legislature are happy to have international and out of state students occupying seats at UNH, the state’s land grant university, for the tuition premium. The remaining seats end up going to the most qualified or connected, in-state students. The typical NH degree candidate ends up at one of the state universities.
You know, banning foreign students can cut both ways
Agree strongly with this post.
Graduates of elite schools are disproportionately represented in the New York Times and other prominent media institutions, as well as in politics. It’s a case of fish not knowing they are wet.
The sad reality is that elite schools have outsized cultural and institutional power compared to the number of graduates they produce – a big reason why they are elite schools.
Let’s also not forget the influence and use of land-grant colleges throughout U.S. history, not just in agricultural but other areas as well.
@Andy:
Indeed.
Just a quick note, observing that foreign students applying for admission only make it more difficult for US applicants by RAISING THE F’ING STANDARDS!! Like, meritocracy.
@JohnMc: That inspired me to make
“> this.
Since the author was talking about elite universities, lets replace “foreigners” with “legacies, athletes, and children of faculty/staff/donors,” since they make up about 30 percent of admitted students at Harvard. Which makes them about twice the size of Harvard’s undergraduate international student population.
@Eusebio: I think that for some portions of the parenthood, the 30% of the total taken by foreign students crowding out the(ir) children of the newer elite is the point. It’s very inegalitarian that my child doesn’t get to go to Harvard simply because the status of my parents wasn’t elite enough. I worked hard enough to qualify as a new elite; my child shouldn’t get crowded out by a foreign student. “It’s unfair. I deserve this more than some [insert appropriate ethnic slur here].”
It’s also not new. When I was attending MIT back in the 1980s we had (in my estimation) roughly 1/4 foreign, 1/4 Jewish background, 1/4 Asian background, and the rest of us were all over the map, ranging from people who could recite their ancestors back to the American Revolution and who did know people nicknamed “Muffy” to a self-described farm boy from Iowa.