MONTEZUMA, N.M. (AP) - Federal immigration officials have rescinded a directive that would have kept international students from attending colleges in the United States, but it’s not going to help the United World College-USA.
Most of the students who attend the northern New Mexico school still are shut out from entering the country because of travel bans and their inability to obtain F-1 visas due to the closure of consulates worldwide, school officials told the Albuquerque Journal.
The travel bans are impacting more than 100 of its students in 31 countries, according to the college.
About three-quarters of the school’s 220 teenage students are from foreign lands. School officials say foreign students can participate in online courses, but students in many countries don’t always have easy access to the internet.
Besides, distance learning isn’t the United World College way.
“We decided months ago when the pandemic first hit that, given our mission, it was important for students to meet face to face,” College President Victoria Mora said. “Not only would it interfere with how we function operationally, it would have precluded us from fulfilling our mission as an institution.”
Founded in 1962 at the height of the Cold War, the school maintains that education is “a force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and a sustainable future.” It’s values include international and cultural understanding, compassion and service, and a sense of idealism.
Mora says those things are best accomplished through first-hand, non-virtual experiences and interactions between students from 90 countries.
The Institute of International Education estimates there are more than 1 million foreign students studying in America, or about 5% of the students attending college in the U.S.
United World College is a global school system that teaches an International Baccalaureate curriculum at 18 schools on five continents, with only three in the Western Hemisphere.
Mora said the other 17 UWC schools around the globe are in better shape when it comes to opening school. Nearly all of them are expected to continue operating as usual.
While some public school districts in New Mexico are favoring a fully remote approach for the fall semester, the college said it’s a unique case.
The school is located in a relatively isolated area in a county that has experienced about three dozen coronavirus cases in all. Mora said school officials are preparing the school for a safe and secure environment for students on campus.
A handful of students are on campus now. Students from China, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nepal and Timor-Leste remained here over the summer and have been working on a farm, the harvest of which is distributed in the community.
The rest of the school’s second-year students are due to report Aug. 1. First-year students are scheduled to show up August 15.
Carl-Martin Nelson, a spokesman at UWC-USA, said the school will open next month well short of capacity with the foreign students able to travel or who remained in the U.S. over the summer and a few dozen American students. More will show up as travel bans are lifted, he said.
In the meantime, the college will blend in-person and distance learning, though that presents another unique challenge. When it’s 1 p.m. in New Mexico, for instance, it’s midnight in Nepal. International students will have to dramatically adjust their lifestyle to participate in class and interact virtually with classmates.
Mora acknowledged UWC-USA could also take a financial hit due to lost tuition and lack of access to endowment funds that help pay scholarships.
“We rely on philanthropy. How we deal with that challenge of not being able to distribute scholarship money is another concern. There are layers and layers of challenges here,” she said.
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