All international students from the Class of 2029 who intended to matriculate at Dartmouth were able, according to dean of undergraduate admissions Kathryn Bezella.
This comes after the Trump administration has facilitated broad revocations of student visas, including suspending the statuses of 6,000 students as of August, according to CNN. In April, two Dartmouth students had their visas revoked, and at least one was reinstated.
Bezella said international students comprise 15% of Dartmouth’s Class of 2029, up from 14% for the Class of 2028. She said she was in conversations with the Office of Visa and Immigration Services, high school counselors and international alumni “all summer,” adding that she “didn’t want to miss anybody.”
Dartmouth’s “international presence is still really robust this year,” Bezella said. “We are in contact with international students and counselors pretty much as we always have been.”
Some ’29s report feeling “scared” on campus as a result of the Trump administration’s strict immigration policies. International students at Dartmouth have previously expressed frustrations over changes to the visa application process and potential revocation.
Three international freshmen students have been given the pseudonyms Nathan, Chloe and Jeremy. They each have been granted anonymity to speak candidly about their experiences, citing fear of visa revocations.
Nathan noted that he applied for his visa in May after his acceptance to Dartmouth and he got a visa appointment for July.
“Most people got rejected [and] some people had to wait three weeks or four weeks, sometimes even one and a half months, so I was kinda scared,” the student said. “Surprisingly I got my visa in like four days.”
Chloe said the process was “a bit stressful” and that they were “under pressure for time.”
“It wasn’t clear how long it was gonna take” to get the visa, Chloe said.
Some international students have been more “scared” on campus due to the new administration’s visa revocation policies, according to Jeremy. He said the administration has created an “environment of fear.”
“I know some of my friends feel censored [and] scared to do stuff because they’re worried that anything small that is against the law — for example, drinking underage — could get them deported,” the student said.
Government professor Yang-Yang Zhou, who studies the “causes and consequences of migration,” said the Trump administration’s policies will have a “deterring effect” on international student arrivals. She added that the administration is creating “an opportunity” for other countries to draw in students who previously would’ve studied in the United States.
However, Nathan said he was undeterred by recent changes to federal policy when making his college decision.
“I kind of considered going to Canada, but then I said, like, okay, [the administration] is not going to affect my education that much, and I really wanted [Dartmouth] much more than I wanted University of Toronto,” Nathan said.
Zhou said there are financial benefits to universities enrolling international students, noting that they often pay tuition at higher rates. She added that more importantly than the financial losses, universities, including American students, will lose from “not hearing other perspectives.”
“Having our classrooms be filled with students from different backgrounds, from different countries, different socioeconomic classes, all of those different perspectives makes a classroom really rich,” Zhou said.
