China News Service, August 18th. According to a report by the American Overseas Chinese News Network, tens of millions of students will flood into college campuses across the United States in the next few weeks.
Many universities are looking forward to starting the first normal school year with face-to-face teaching since the outbreak.
However, in addition to the continuous spread of the Delta strain, another factor is also threatening the ability of American universities to recover as usual. That is: American universities may be losing their attractiveness to Chinese students, and China is the largest in the United States. The place of origin of the foreign student.
"Fortune" magazine reported that according to data from the application platform "CommonApp", compared with last year, the number of applications from Chinese students this year has decreased by 18%.
Given that compared with the previous cycle, the number of international student applications from American universities in this cycle has increased by 9%, so the decline in the number of Chinese student applications is particularly obvious.
This situation threatens an important and stable source of income for American universities.
According to estimates by the Department of Commerce, international students contributed $44 billion to the U.S. economy in 2019.
That year, the contributions from Chinese students accounted for approximately $15.9 billion.
According to analysis, the declining interest of Chinese students stems from factors such as the US visa restrictions on Chinese students and the increase in racism against Asians during the epidemic.
Outbreak of the epidemic, study abroad channels closed
In March 2020, when university campuses closed and teaching became online, Chinese students and other international students faced a difficult choice: either go home or find a place to live.
Hanson, who was a sophomore at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, chose to stay because it was expensive to return to Beijing.
Although Hansen was almost isolated from the rest of the world during the epidemic, Hansen's advantage in staying here was reflected after the resumption of classes.
When classes resume in the fall of 2020, Chinese students who have returned home will need to fly to a third country for isolation for two weeks before coming to the United States.
And because the US consulates around the world have basically suspended visa services in the past few months, it is difficult for Chinese freshmen to travel to the United States.
However, with the reopening of more consulates this year and the policy of giving priority to student visas, from May to June, the United States approved a total of 57,000 Chinese student visas.
The drop in Chinese students has a lasting impact
Michigan State University (MSU) is one of the schools that has begun to attract Chinese students in recent decades.
From 2006 to 2016, the number of Chinese students at the university increased 7 times.
However, from 2016 to 2019, the number of Chinese students at the university dropped by about 7% every year.
Patty Croom, director of international admissions at Michigan State University, said: "The past few years have been a difficult period because (the number of Chinese students enrolled) has been declining. The epidemic has exacerbated this situation."
Kristin Crosby, director of international admissions at Ohio Wesleyan University, said: “Almost all schools believe that the number of applicants for Chinese students in most schools has dropped sharply. This is a huge income. Hit." (Yang Yaqiao)