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Overturning a decades-old policy, the US government will soon limit international students to no more than four years in the United States unless they can secure an extension from the US government. That’s according to a new rule from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
The current system allows students to stay for the length of their academic programme. The DHS says that the change, which takes effect from 15 September, “combats rampant visa abuse” and “restores integrity to the nation’s immigration system”.
It also says that establishing a fixed amount of time for F-1 visas, which allow international students to study in the United States, will end exploitation by “forever students” who continuously enrol in courses to remain in the country legally.
On average, it takes 5.6 years for students in the United States to complete a PhD in science or engineering. Researchers worry that imposing a four-year limit could lead to less rigorous US PhD programmes and curtail the flow of international students into the United States. The new rule also prohibits graduate students on F-1 visas from switching programmes or institutions. There were some 488,000 international graduate students in the United States in the 2024–25 academic year.
The policy will deprive US academic institutions of talented students who could contribute to the national scientific enterprise, says Bennett Goldberg, a physicist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
“For decades, international students have been encouraged to come and study in the United States,” he says. These restrictions mark “the dissolution of the dream of becoming a leading US innovator and scientist”.
The DHS did not respond to Nature’s request for comment about the new rule’s potential effects.
Extensive checks
Since 1978, full-time students from outside the United States have been able to stay in the country for their “duration of status”, meaning as long as they were making “normal progress toward completing their educational objective”
Under the new rule, international students who are in the United States as of 15 September will be allowed to stay for four years after that date. But international students arriving after that cannot exceed four years without an ‘extension of stay’, which the DHS says would be “only available with rigorous vetting”, including background and security checks.
Some experts expect this new rule to drive away students. “Doctoral student enrolment will continue to contract as a self-inflicted wound of America,” says Chris Glass, a higher-education researcher at Boston College in Massachusetts.
The United States is not alone in tightening up the rules for international students. Australia is limiting its numbers, and the United Kingdom has barred some students from bringing their families with them.
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