Tampering with our formula for success
Students at Stony Brook University. SUNY schools saw a 13.8% drop this fall in students from abroad enrolled in graduate programs, and a 3.9% drop in international students overall. Credit: Newsday/John Paraskevas
You might have heard of Noubar Afeyan. He’s the co-founder of Moderna, the highly successful biotech company and mRNA vaccine pioneer. Through his venture capital firm and other avenues, he has cofounded and built more than 100 life science and technology startups. He also has started and developed several significant humanitarian projects.
Afeyan was born in Lebanon to Armenian emigres, and later fled with his family to Canada during a civil war. After finishing his undergraduate degree there, he moved to the United States to earn a PhD in biochemical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He became a U.S. citizen in 2008.
Afeyan’s story is worth recalling as we digest the news that the number of new international students at American colleges and universities declined this fall. This is dismaying, but not surprising. The Trump administration has been actively trying to reduce the number of foreign students enrolling in the American higher education system. Unfortunately, the effort seems to be having its desired effect.
The number of international students enrolling for the first time in American colleges and universities — new students from overseas, in other words — dropped by 17% this fall, according to Institute of International Education data published this past week. Local reports were similarly alarming — a 13.8% drop this fall in students from abroad enrolled in graduate programs at State University of New York campuses, and a 3.9% drop in international students overall at SUNY schools.
If those trends continue, the impact could be devastating.
The American system of higher education is generally considered preeminent in the world, and many of the world’s best and brightest come here to be educated. This relationship is symbiotic; our nation benefits from their presence, especially from those who stay here after graduation. While some of the current hand-wringing over the decline in international students notes the loss of revenue for schools accustomed to large numbers of foreign students who often pay full tuition, a legitimate issue for those schools, the greater loss for our country would be the withering of a gushing pipeline of international talent.
There are several ways to measure that potential loss:
About one-quarter of U.S. companies valued at more than $1 billion have a founder who was an international student at an American university, according to a 2022 report from the National Foundation for American Policy. Among those companies: OpenAI, SpaceX, Grammarly, Stripe, Noom, Sandisk and Calendly.
From the inception of the Nobel Prizes in 1901 through 2024, 15% of U.S.-affiliated winners in academic disciplines were immigrants who earned their highest degree from U.S. universities. International students make up more than half of PhD students in STEM fields in America, and more than 70% of them settle in the United States after graduation, according to the Institute for Immigration Research.
Hundreds of foreign heads of state or government were educated in this country, including current leaders in Belgium, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Egypt, Finland, Greece, Iceland, Israel and Singapore.
International students who study in the United States and remain here are entrepreneurial and resourceful. They are drivers of innovation, creators of capital, sources of job creation, and makers of major discoveries in science and medicine. They take leadership roles in science, technology, business and management. If they return to their homes, they bring with them an exposure to American values and practices and deep networking ties.
They are, in other words, continuing to help weave the multinational fabric that has always been the backbone of our nation and one of America’s greatest calling cards.
President Donald Trump muddled matters recently by proposing student visas for up to 600,000 tuition-paying Chinese citizens to help universities stay solvent. Yet, his administration’s threats have led some schools to put limits on graduate school admissions in particular and some students to look elsewhere to pursue their studies and dreams.
America has had a centurylong formula for success. We tamper with that at our peril.
Columnist Michael Dobie’s opinions are his own.
Michael Dobie is a retired member of the Newsday editorial board.
