
The Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) recently published its 2020 SEVIS by the Numbers report outlining Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) data on F-1 students from calendar year 2020. The report provides a comprehensive picture of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on international student enrollment at American institutions last year, revealing that the number of international students in the U.S. decreased by 17.86% and the number of new international student enrollments decreased by 72%.
COVID-19 did not take an equal toll on international enrollment at different levels of study. Associate degree and intensive English programs saw more significant losses than did programs at other levels of study in 2020—especially doctoral programs, which made it through the year relatively unscathed. This marks a continuation of pre-pandemic trends up until 2019/20, and it threatens to erase early signs of recovery for associate degree and intensive English programs which emerged just before the pandemic began.
Continue reading “All things not equal: SEVIS data show COVID-19 took disproportionate toll on language programs in U.S.”