International students have been a growing presence on U.S. campuses since the 1940s. Just in the past decade, their numbers almost doubled—increasing from 583,000 in 2006 to slightly more than a million in 2016. With President Donald Trump’s aggressive anti-immigrant rhetoric, the travel ban and heated talk in Washington, D.C., about tariffs and possible immigration restrictions for students—particularly from China—international student administrators in Milwaukee are sighing and hoping for the best.

Even before the recent tough talk about Chinese students—who make up 30% of all international students in the U.S.—international student enrollment was declining. According to a 2018 National Science Foundation report, international undergraduate enrollment fell 2.2% from fall 2016 to 2017, while graduate enrollment declined 5.5%. Open Doors reported that the number of first-time international students declined by 7% in the 2017-’18 academic year. Meanwhile, the number of international students in Canada increased by 20% from 2016 to 2017 according to the Canadian Bureau for International Education.

Washington’s tough talk has proved to be controversial within the business community. “Targeting foreign students will undermine U.S. competitiveness, not enhance it,” a recent Bloomberg editorial opined under a headline that read “Reducing student visas for foreigners is self-defeating and un-American.”

The new policies and tough talk are taking their toll locally. At UW-Milwaukee, the number of international students is down from a high of around 1,600 in 2015 to 1,462 this year, a decline over three years of around 8%. These students come from 91 countries, and about 100 students come from travel-ban countries. “UWM has the second-highest number of international students after Madison,” says Jennifer Gruenewald, director of the university’s International Student and Scholar Services. Despite the downturn, she says that the university remains “very strong. We have not seen the decline that other schools have.”

The Trump Effect

Yet, she does have concerns. Since Trump was elected president, she has seen an increase in the time spent counseling students about the travel ban, as well as about travel and reentry to the U.S. She also has noticed increased concerns about work authorization, because there is talk in our nation’s capital about changes to this program. The optional program allows students to work for a year after graduation as part of their student visa. Gruenewald adds that students also are expressing increased concerns about racial and cultural stereotypes and the impact they might have on their experience. “It’s scary for a foreigner to come here just based on the news,” Gruenewald says. “I’ve been in this field for 20 years, and it just feels very different now.”

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Despite the uncertainties and a charged political environment, Gruenewald says UWM remains “a very welcoming place for international students. They have a real opportunity here to be a contributing member to campus life. They have a lot to contribute. And a lot to gain.” However, she adds that the decline in international enrollment “is making UWM a less diverse campus. I am really hopeful that the downward trend won’t continue. UWM is an R1 campus for research, and that is helping. That is very attractive to students to have that ranking.” An “R1” rating is a Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education rating for top research universities in the country. UWM achieved this ranking in 2016. Only 115 out of 4,665 American universities are rated R1.

International Enrollment Increases in Madison

Bucking national trends, international applications at UW-Madison have increased by 15% this year according to Roopa Rawjee, assistant dean of International Student Services. This is because UW-Madison “has an exceptionally strong brand nationally and internationally,” she says. Rawjee states that application submissions also have been robust because Madison is using the universal Common Application for admissions and because the university is diversifying its reach to countries beyond the mature markets in China, India and South Korea. UW-Madison currently has 4,000 international students from 120 countries enrolled.

At Marquette University, international applications peaked in 2014 but fell in 2015 and 2016, according to Ellen Blauw, associate director of MU’s Office of International Education. In 2017, the number of applicants was similar to 2016. Applications for fall 2018 are now in. “We all are speculating at this point whether we will mirror the trend of having decreased enrollment,” Blauw says. “Students apply to multiple universities and then make decisions based on a variety of reasons, such as location, program and cost. We just think that there may be some other factors coming into play besides those usual factors.”

Blauw says international events, safety, career opportunities and the feeling that the U.S. is a welcoming place are all factors that shape a family’s decision about country and school. Around 50% of MU’s international students are Chinese; students from 63 countries make up the university’s total international population.

Benefits of an International Education

“Most of us in this field see international education as important for all involved,” Blauw says. Domestic students who may not have the opportunity to learn about a culture by direct experience through foreign travel or exchange can still have that experience by sitting next to someone in a classroom, by living in the apartment next to them and by riding the bus with them, she adds. Likewise, international students “who come here will benefit from [higher education in the U.S.] and go on in their lives—whether it’s here or back home—and from the experience of a culture that values their perspectives.” About 25% of MU’s American undergraduates have participated in foreign exchange programs when they graduate.

Besides making intellectual contributions and enhancing cultural diversity on college campuses and in the wider community, international students also contribute $37 billion annually to the U.S. economy, according to the National Association of Foreign Student Advisers. More than 13,000 international students add $400 million to the economy and support 5,000 jobs throughout the state of Wisconsin. In the greater Milwaukee area, international students contribute more than $106 million annually to the economy through their enrollment at 11 colleges and universities.