Some thoughts on foreign graduate student citizenship [View all]

[johnd83]

Last edited Wed Jan 25, 2012, 03:47 AM - Edit history (1)

I recently finished graduate school earning my Ph.D. in engineering (Hurray!). During my time in graduate school I had lots of foreign friends and fellow students. There were not that many US citizens working toward a PhD. considering it was in the US; the reasons for this are numerous and fairly complex. I can go into them if anyone is interested. Because of the way graduate students are funded it works out that many of them were actually funded by NSF or other federal money. I am not against having foreign students studying in the US and having federal funding. The US has been a haven for scientists and engineers for several generations. What does really bother me though is the immigration policy.

I asked some of my friends if they were planning on staying in the US. Some were, some were not. Talking with them I found out that attempting to work in the US even with a Ph.D. was a bureaucratic nightmare requiring complex visa paperwork and sponsorship from a company. If they were let go or wanted to change jobs, they would lose the visa and be back at square one. Some of my friends had decided it was just too complicated to stay in the US and were going to return home.

So we are left in a situation where we attract and pay to educate the best and brightest in the entire world, but when they are done we send them home to compete against us even though many of them would like to stay. This is a relatively simple problem to fix: if a foreign student earns an advanced degree in STEM or related field they get some form of permanent residence with a path to citizenship. I don't even see why this is controversial! There is a huge shortage of skilled engineers and scientists.

I know this was a minor point in the SOTU but I think it is one that is overlooked too often.