Student-Visa Denials Are Up One in three applicants was refused a visa in 2025, new data show.

For more analysis of visa trends and other international-education news, check out my weekly newsletter, Latitudes www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

It's not just that student-visa denials are up — it's that they spiked in major emerging markets. In India, the biggest sender of international students to the U.S., 61% of visa applicants were refused in 2025. By contrast, in China, the previous top source, denial rates were 18%

Student-Visa Denials Are Up One in three applicants was refused a visa in 2025, new data show.

The U.S. rejected one in three student-visa applicants last year, according to just-released government data. Denial rates have ticked up over the past decade and are significantly higher than refusal rates for other nonimmigrant visas
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For weekly news and insight into international education, subscribe to my newsletter, Latitudes www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Only about a tenth of Americans study in China now compared to the high, of 14,887, in the 2011 academic year. That's troubling to those who believe that a deep understanding of this geopolitically and economically powerful country is critical.

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Is China Expertise Evaporating? With few Americans studying in China, the United States could lose on-the-ground knowledge of its geopolitical rival.

The United States will face a “critical shortage” of China experts with on-the-ground experience within a decade if the number of Americans studying there continues to be perilously low, a new report warns. www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Who Gets an International Education? Smaller, poorer, and vocationally focused community colleges may be less likely to offer students global activities.

For more international-education news, subscribe to my weekly newsletter, Latitudes www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Ahead of this week's Final Four, I took a look at the share of international students on the remaining men's and women's teams. The most global: @uarizona.bsky.social , where half the team is from overseas, from Australia to South Sudan

Colleges Need a New Sales Pitch Higher ed touts itself as the pathway to a solid first job. Economic and tech disruptions are revealing the limits of that story.

For years, there has been a dominant narrative about college: Earning a degree is the surest pathway to the American dream. Lately, though, thanks to AI and economic shifts, that story line has begun to unravel.
www.chronicle.com/article/why-...

Who Gets an International Education? Smaller, poorer, and vocationally focused community colleges may be less likely to offer students global activities.

Access to study abroad and other global-education activities is not equitable across community colleges, differing by focus, mission, and wealth, a new report found. www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Colleges Need a New Sales Pitch Higher ed touts itself as the pathway to a solid first job. Economic and tech disruptions are revealing the limits of that story.

For years, there has been a dominant narrative about college: Earning a degree is the surest pathway to the American dream. Lately, though, thanks to AI and economic shifts, that story line has begun to unravel.
www.chronicle.com/article/why-...

For Student Visas, No September Reprieve Colleges relaxed rules to welcome late arrivals, but new data show summertime’s big drop in visa issuances continued into the fall.

This analysis comes from Latitudes, my weekly newsletter on international education: www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Optional training, the postgraduate work program for international students, has become a major steppingstone to long-term work in the U.S. — more than half of recent recipients of H-1B skilled-worker visas first came to the country on student visas.

For Student Visas, No September Reprieve Colleges relaxed rules to welcome late arrivals, but new data show summertime’s big drop in visa issuances continued into the fall.

Read more about the latest student-visa data and other global-education news in my weekly newsletter: www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

The number of U.S. student visas issued in India the busiest summer months fell more than 60 percent ahead of the current academic year. Colleges hoped some of the backlog could be handled in September. It didn't happen: State Dept data show just 706 student visas were processed.

For Student Visas, No September Reprieve Colleges relaxed rules to welcome late arrivals, but new data show summertime’s big drop in visa issuances continued into the fall.

Many colleges relaxed rules to allow late arrivals of international students because of worldwide visa delays, but visas awarded in September did little to make up for precipitous summertime declines in issuances www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Latitudes Get a rundown of the top stories in international ed and Karin Fischer’s expert analysis. Delivered on Wednesdays. To read this newsletter as soon as it sends, sign up to receive it in your email inbo...

Several data points that suggest international student in the U.S. may be skewing toward selectivity — a trend that could disadvantage colleges least able to absorb enrollment and tuition shocks. For weekly news and analysis on global education, subscribe: www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Half of all international applications via the Common App went to the most selective U.S. colleges. The prestige gap may be widening: Foreign apps to the most elite colleges have held steady this admissions season while overseas interest in less selective institutions plummeted.

Sian Beilock’s Star Turn Dartmouth’s president has a diagnosis for higher ed, and a cure. Her own campus is sharply divided about both.

www.chronicle.com/article/sian...

Sian Beilock represents a new breed of college president willing to take shots at her own sector, which she says has lost its way by becoming too expensive and too political.

Skewing Toward Selectivity The United States has long been a draw for the top students from overseas. What if that’s all who the country attracts?

What if the United States, long the most popular destination for international students, became defined more by quality than quantity? www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Is the Sky Falling for International Enrollment? New student-visa issuances fell by more than a third, State Department data show.

For more on the larger-than-expected visas declines, check out Latitudes, my newsletter on global education www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

U.S. student-visa issuances ahead of the last academic year fell more than 60 percent in India. But declines in incoming international students were even steeper in Nepal and Nigeria.

Is the Sky Falling for International Enrollment? New student visa issuances fell by more than a third, State Department data show.

In this week's Latitudes: troubling signs for international enrollments, a call for oversight of Chinese student groups, and another state jumps on the bandwagon of trying to limit colleges' H-1B hiring. www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

From bad to worse: The number of visas awarded to foreign students took a nosedive in the summer of 2025, plummeting 36 percent, according to just-released data from the State Department, a troubling sign for U.S. colleges. I've got the analysis 👇

The Drop in International Students Last Year Was Worse Than We Thought Visa issuances nosedived 36 percent, possibly reflecting weakening global interest in studying in the United States.

NEW: The bad news about international-student enrollments at American colleges just got worse. An exclusive @chronicle.com analysis of just-released State Department data shows new visa issuances in the summer of 2025 dropped by more than a third. www.chronicle.com/article/the-...

House committee chairmen are asking the U.S. State Department to designate Chinese Students and Scholars Associations as "foreign missions" of the Chinese government, requiring government approval of all public events files.constantcontact.com/f0eecb46901/...

Will War Further Fray Colleges’ Ties in the Middle East? Conflict with Iran is just the latest blow to academic engagement in the region.

The war with Iran is closing U.S. branch campuses in the Middle East and prompting do-not-travel warnings for the region. But the conflict is the latest event to fray U.S. ties in a part of the world that had been a priority for many colleges www.chronicle.com/newsletter/l...

Contributions are welcome: How is the conflict affecting U.S. study-abroad programs or branch campuses? What is the impact on local universities in the region? What kind of advice or support are American colleges providing the 13,000 Iranian students studying here?

Iran War Live Updates: Satellite Campuses Hunker Down as Conflict Expands We’re tracking the latest developments on the federal government’s attempt to give preferential access to research funding to campuses that agree to policy changes.

NEW: For updates about higher education and the war in the Middle East, @chronicle.com has started a live updates page. www.chronicle.com/article/iran...

“Dhs illegally arrested me. Please help.”

-- A Columbia University neuroscience researcher who posted this on Instagram in the wake of DHS's actions on campus.

www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2026/02...