Graduate physics departments across the country report that foreign
students are facing fewer problems due to visa restrictions than two
years ago. The departments also report experiencing recent increases
in the number of highly-qualified applicants who are US citizens, according
to a report from the American Institute of Physics (AIP). Another report,
from the National Science Foundation (NSF), found that enrollment by
US students in science and engineering graduate programs across the
country has turned upward in the last few years, after declining through
the 1990s.
AIP Report: "Physics Students from Abroad: Monitoring the Continuing
Impact of Visa Problems":
A September 2005 report from AIP's Statistical Research Center indicates
that the impact of post-9/11 visa restrictions on physics graduate departments
has lessened between the Fall of 2002 and the Fall of 2004. The report
suggests that recent declines in the percentage of incoming physics
graduate students who are foreign may be largely due to other factors,
including an "increase in the number of well-qualified US-citizen
candidates."
In early 2003, in the wake of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent
tightening of visa restrictions for foreign students, AIP's Statistical
Research Center conducted a survey of US graduate physics departments
to determine "how many departments had experienced difficulties
with already-accepted foreign students gaining entry into this country
for the Fall of 2002." Responses from 75 percent of departments
indicated that "visa difficulties were widespread," and that
approximately 20 percent of all accepted foreign physics graduate students
were prevented from starting their studies in the Fall of 2002.
In the Fall of 2004, the Statistical Research Center conducted a follow-up
study, and found that the problem of international students being delayed
or prevented from entering US physics departments, "which was widespread
in the Fall of 2002, had diminished by this past Fall" for all
types of physics departments surveyed. However, about half of PhD-granting
departments reported accepting one or more foreign students whose entry
was delayed or denied due to visa problems, and about 60% of PhD departments
reported that "currently enrolled foreign students had experienced
problems securing return visas during the previous year."
According to the report, "large, prestigious PhD departments...received
just as many applications from non-citizens as they had two years earlier,
but actually enrolled 12% fewer," with many respondents commenting
that "they reduced the foreign component because there were so
many excellent US citizen candidates from which to choose." The
report continues, "The second-tier PhD departments actually experienced
a substantial upsurge (+23%) in foreign applications compared with 2002,
but...still enrolled fewer (-4%) than they had earlier.... The smaller
PhD programs saw a substantial 34% drop in applications, but surprisingly
admitted many more foreign students (+50%) than they had before."
The percentage of non-US citizens among first-year graduate students
remained relatively unchanged over this period.
These findings "provide a very mixed picture," the report
says. "On the one hand, after several decades of steady growth,
the proportion of non-US citizens among physics graduate students seems
to be stabilizing or declining a bit, after having peaked at just over
50%. At the same time," it continues, "it is difficult to
make a clear connection between this change and the heightened visa
barriers that have been put into place in the years following the 9/11
attacks, since the leveling off started before 9/11, and the drop-off
has persisted in the latest data despite the reported easing of the
visa strictures." Nevertheless, the report adds, "the 2004
data show that a substantial number of foreign candidates continue to
be impeded by the heightened stringency in visa regulations."
The entire text of the report (AIP Pub. No. R-440, September 2005),
is available at http://www.aip.org/statistics/
along with other reports from AIP's Statistical Research Center; look
under the heading "International."
NSF InfoBrief: "Graduate Enrollment in Science and Engineering
Programs Up in 2003, but Declines for First-Time Foreign Students":
An August "InfoBrief" by NSF's Division of Science Resources
Statistics examines recent graduate enrollment trends for US and foreign
students in all fields of science and engineering. "Graduate enrollment
in science and engineering (S&E) programs reached an all-time high
of 474,203 students in fall 2003, a gain of 4 percent over S&E enrollment
in 2002 and a gain of 9 percent over 1993," it found. The report
says that "Graduate enrollment in 2003 grew in all major S&E
fields and in all subfields except computer sciences.... Of the fields
of study with the largest graduate enrollments (10,000 or more), mechanical
engineering led with an 8 percent gain, followed by mathematical sciences
and physics, each with 7 percent gains." Graduate enrollment in
the physical sciences increased 6.1 percent from 2002 to 2003, to a
total of 34,298 students. The field of physics saw 7.3 percent growth,
to 12,555 students, while astronomy experienced 9.1 percent growth,
to 1,080 students.
According to the report, "The proportion of women among S&E
graduate students grew from 36 percent in 1993 to 42 percent in 2003....
In contrast, after reaching a peak...in 1993, enrollment of men declined
every year from 1993 to 1998" and, although increasing by 4 percent
between 2002 and 2003, is "still below the 1993 peak enrollment."
The report found that "Over the past decade, enrollment of minority
students in graduate S&E programs has grown, whereas enrollment
of white students has declined." In 2003, Asian/Pacific Islanders
accounted for 10 percent of S&E graduate enrollment, while black
students accounted for 7 percent, Hispanics for 6 percent, and American
Indians/Alaska Natives accounted for less than 1 percent.
For foreign graduate students with temporary visas, their total number
across all S&E fields rose in 2003 to 146,871, but the growth in
their numbers slowed between 2002 and 2003, and they declined as a proportion
of all S&E graduate students (from 32 to 31 percent).
The complete text of this InfoBrief (NSF 05-317, August 2005), is available
at http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf05317/
.
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