The Trump administration has officially ended a policy, in place for more than 45 years, that allowed international students and researchers to overstay their visas until their studies are finished. Instead, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued a final rule imposing a new four-year time limit on visas for international students and researchers with F-1 student and J-1 exchange visitor status. Chemistry and other research PhDs typically take five years to complete in the US and under the new rule students could be forced to leave the US for their home country – potentially at great expense – simply to secure an extension to keep studying. Higher education groups are pushing back against the new requirements, which are set to take effect on 15 September.
Rather than being admitted for the length of their academic programme, students and researchers holding these types of US visas will be required to either file an extension with the DHS to cover the remainder of their programme or leave and re-enter the US with a new arrival/departure record issued by US Customs and Border Protection. Such round trip travel could cost hundreds of dollars plus administrative fees, and many graduate labour unions offer dedicated international worker support funds that reimburse up to $1500 (£1126) per academic year for eligible employees.
The DHS said it issued the final rule, published on 17 July, to help address ‘instances of abuse and fraud where the foreign student has no intent to study and remains in the United States indefinitely’, and strengthen vetting of individuals in the country under these visa categories.
The agency claimed that data from the US Student Exchange Visitor Information System indicated that more than 2100 foreigners who first entered as F-1 students between 2000 and 2010 remain in active F-1 status as of 6 April 2025. But organisations like the National Foundation for American Policy, a non-partisan thinktank focused on issues like immigration and international trade, pointed out that the figure represents just 0.067% of the estimated 3.1 million people who entered the US on F-1 student visas during that decade-long period.
There will be a transition period for foreign students who are currently in the US on these visas that allows them to remain while an ‘extension of stay’ application is pending, the DHS noted.
But there were more than 20,000 public comments that raised serious concerns in response to the original proposed rule that the agency announced back in August 2025, according to Nafsa: Association of International Educators.
‘DHS’s decision to end duration of status is a misguided and unnecessary policy shift that injects uncertainty, bureaucracy and fear into a system that has long worked effectively,’ stated Fanta Aw, Nafsa’s executive director and chief executive. She argued that the agency’s new rule ‘introduces unnecessary government intrusion into academic decision-making’ by requiring students and scholars to seek approval to extend their academic programme, switch majors or pursue the next level of study.
Research universities are also concerned that these restrictions would eliminate the ability of international students to change their educational objectives or switch degrees. In addition, they worry that foreign PhD students whose faculty advisers move to a new institution wouldn’t be able to transfer and continue working with them.
Aw said international students and exchange visitors are already ‘the most monitored non-immigrant populations’ in the US and vowed that Nafsa will ‘vigorously explore’ all available avenues to challenge the new DHS regulation.
The four-year time limit will almost certainly cause problems for PhD students. The median time for a research PhD at US institutions is 5.6 years, according to the most recent data from the National Science Foundation. At the University of California, Davis, for example, the time to complete a chemistry PhD is four to six years, with a typical student finishing in five years.
The Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a coalition of US college and university leaders, also opposes the DHS regulation and says that it would duplicate oversight of international students. ‘The rule will exacerbate existing immigration application backlogs, create further uncertainty, intrude on academic decision-making, impose new bureaucratic hurdles and, ultimately, deter international students, researchers and scholars from choosing the United States,’ warned Zuzana Wootson, the deputy director of federal policy at the Presidents’ Alliance. ‘It is counterproductive and will ultimately harm our economy and global competitiveness.’
No comments yet