US sees 11% decline in international student enrollment: report

The Institute of International Education's (IIE) Fall 2024 report initially noted a 3% increase in foreign student enrollment at U.S. colleges and universities at the start of the 2024-2025 academic year compared to the previous year. However, new analysis based on data from the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS), managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, highlights a substantial decline.

This analysis was conducted by Professor Chris Glass, a higher education expert at Boston University, who found that the number of international students enrolling between March 2024 and March 2025 dropped by 11% compared to the same period the previous year.

"The overall decline of 11.33% (-130,624 active students) from March 2024 (1,153,169) to March 2025 (1,022,545) is remarkable in both scale and speed," Glass wrote on his website.

"For context, this represents a potential revenue loss of up to $4 billion for U.S. institutions in a single year, assuming average tuition and living expenses of around $30,000 per student."

He said the drop is close to "the dramatic" 15% drop during Covid-19.

The decline is observed across all academic levels, particularly at the master’s level.

According to Glass, contributing factors include fewer students from key markets and historically high visa rejection rates. India, a major source of international students, saw a decrease of approximately 28%, reversing previous growth trends.

Other key markets, such as Brazil and Nigeria, experienced similar declines. Brazil, among the top 10 source countries in the 2023-2024 academic year, saw a 14% drop, while Nigerian student enrollments dropped by 16%.

Glass believes future enrollment numbers may further decline due to President Trump's policies, including potential upcoming travel restrictions affecting several countries.

Additionally, funding for research programs at universities has been sharply reduced over the past three months.

On Tuesday, the federal government announced it would freeze more than $2.2 billion in grants and $60 million in contracts to Harvard University after the institution indicated it would defy the Trump administration's demands to limit activism on campus, AP reported.

The administration also paused federal funding for the University of Pennsylvania, Brown, Princeton, Cornell, Northwestern, and Columbia universities.

Subsequently, over 60 universities received warnings about potentially losing federal funding if they did not adequately address anti-Semitic behavior on campus.

Students at Yale University in the U.S. Photo courtesy of the university

Professor Glass estimates that between 50,000 and 77,000 international students enrolled in STEM graduate programs could be impacted, accounting for approximately 10% of students in this category.

"The dramatic shift in international student enrolment has the potential to reshape American higher education in ways that would be difficult to reverse," Glass wrote. "I don't think this is just another cyclical fluctuation—but rather a more fundamental restructuring that will have profound implications for university finances, research output, and America's position in the global knowledge economy."

According to IIE's Open Doors report, during the 2023-2024 academic year, the U.S. hosted more than one million students from over 200 countries and territories, contributing approximately $50 billion to the economy.

Among these were over 22,000 Vietnamese students, ranking sixth in total numbers, according to ICEF Monitor, a market intelligence firm specializing in international education.