Chinese students turn away from US schooling

For many Chinese, the dream of securing an academic degree in the United States is losing its appeal, with a dramatic drop in enrollments by Chinese students at US universities over the past two years.

The number of Chinese students in the US had been on a steady trajectory and peaked at more than 372,000 in 2019. They accounted for 35 percent of all international students in the US, and Chinese students added $15.9 billion to the US economy that year, according to an estimate by the Institute of International Education.

However, that trend is reversing. The number of Chinese on US campuses dropped by 15 percent in the 2020-21 academic year to about 317,000. In 2022, there will likely be a larger drop, due to a halving in the number of F-1 visas issued to Chinese students in the first six months of the year.

A recent analysis by The Chronicle of Higher Education showed that "only about 47,000 F-1 visas were issued to Chinese students this summer, 40,000 fewer than were issued from May to August 2021, a 45 percent decline".

Education observers said that while the pandemic was a big factor in disrupting Chinese student inflows, the tension between the US and China and the US domestic situation also contributed to the drop.

Reports of racially motivated crimes against Asians and rising gun violence in the US are unnerving to many potential Chinese and Asian students.

"My teenage son changed his mind late last year," a Chinese mother, who wanted to be identified only by her surname Chen, told China Daily. "Like many ambitious kids, he wanted to pursue higher education in the US, but he changed his mind and told me he would no longer consider the US because he's scared by all the Asian hate crimes happening in the US."

Chen said the reports of gun violence in the US are another major concern for her and other parents. "Many of us don't want our children to risk their lives for a fancy US diploma. It's not worth it."

Declining appeal

The 2022 Report on Chinese Students' Overseas Study by New Oriental Education showed that only 30 percent of surveyed students wanted to study in the US, a plunge of 51 percent from 2015.

Xiaofeng Wan, associate dean of admissions and the coordinator of international recruitment at Amherst College, wrote recently in University World News that "over the last few years, Chinese students have been drawn to many competitor countries of the US".

Data for the UK showed that Chinese student applications there had increased by 10 percent by the end of June.

Wan said the US is no longer the only destination for Chinese families to send their children, and that 70 to 80 percent of Chinese students now apply to colleges in many other countries.

Alice Miao, a 2022 graduate from a top high school in Beijing, failed to obtain admission to her dream school, the Rhode Island School of Design. However, she was admitted to other top art programs at US institutions, such as the Parsons School of Design and the University of Chicago.

In the end, she chose the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. The primary reason: cost.

"The UK tuition was much cheaper than American colleges, and the school is as good, if not better," Miao told China Daily.