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First Thought

Insights drawn weekly from Karin Fischer’s global-education newsletter, latitude(s). Subscribe here.

A huge social-spending bill poised to win congressional approval would increase fees for international students while permitting DACA recipients to qualify for federal financial aid.

The Build Back Better Act, the cornerstone of the Biden administration’s agenda on education, health care, immigration, and more, was set for a U.S. House vote on Friday, only to be held up by disputes between moderate and liberal Democrats. Still, congressional leaders have vowed passage before the Thanksgiving recess — although the measure faces tight margins in both the House and Senate. Here are a few key international-education provisions to be aware of:

The bill authorizes the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to collect a “supplemental fee” of $250 for each student-visa holder. The $250 is in addition to current fees paid to the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, and the bill language appears to levy it on the college where students are enrolled, not on individual students. Despite that, some international-student administrators told me that their colleges would likely pass along the costs. Others worried the extra fees could add up and weaken already-shaky support for international students at their institutions.

Read more from Karin, including on how the bill could affect Optional Practical Training, in this week’s latitude(s).

The Reading List

• When it comes to competing with China on high-tech talent, the United States may be squandering its advantage, says a new paper from the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
• Colleges say they are offering scholarships and appointments to displaced Afghan students and scholars, but they are being denied U.S. visas because they can’t prove “non-immigrant intent.”
• South Korea said it would make all high-school seniors with Covid-19 take the country’s high-stakes college entrance exam from a hospital or quarantine facility.
• The military coup in Myanmar has ended many young people’s dreams of higher education and of international study.

Featured on Chronicle.com

“How do we figure out how to build common infrastructure when our users need slightly different things?”

—Kevin Miller, the district director of enterprise technology architecture at the State Center Community College District, on one of the questions facing institutions that are looking to build broadband capacity for their students. In The Chronicle, Taylor Swaak writes about the digital redlining that has left swaths of the country’s urban and rural areas with poor internet access: “One College District Brainstorms Internet-Access Solutions — With Help From the Local School System.”