Harvard Is Not The Enemy

The administration’s targeting of the independence of higher-ed will undermine discovery, innovation, the economy, and civil society.

What Happened: Student Visas Cancelled at Harvard

On May 22, the US Department of Homeland Security issued a letter revoking Harvard’s student and exchange visitor program. Sec. Noem shared the letter in parallel, by tweet. The letter conveyed a simple message: the U.S. Government will not issue visas to foreign students and researchers enrolled at Harvard for the next academic year and will terminate existing visas for foreign students and researchers already here, effectively immediately.

The decision will reverberate, even if reversed by judicial review.

Whatsoever one thinks of Harvard’s response to student protests, the objective of this latest attack on higher education is wholly unrelated to any kind of good faith, targeted, and proportionate effort to combat anti-Semitism and discrimination of all kinds on college campuses. Instead, the administration is using Harvard as an example and as leverage to dismantle and control higher-education institutions nationwide.

The choice of Harvard (as it was for Columbia) is strategic. Harvard is a world-class institution. Admission rates are low, the faculty are often world leaders (with many dozens of Nobel Laureates in present and past ranks), and the institution benefits from hundreds of years of accumulated wealth. But, despite what the administration might tell you, Harvard is not the enemy. Although attacks against ‘elite’ institutions may seem politically expedient they won’t make us better off. Instead, these attacks will undermine scientific progress, communities, our economy, and civil society.

Who Is Affected: Far More Than Foreign Visa Holders

The Harvard Crimson reports that more than 6,000 international students are directly impacted by this latest order revoking Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification. Conventionally we think of foreign exchange students through the lens of undergraduate admissions. Both private and public higher education institutions have made strategic decisions to admit foreign students. The advantages accrue on many levels: to domestic students, to foreign students, and to institutions.

First for public colleges and university, there are direct financial benefits to the recruitment and matriculation of foreign students who often pay full tuition and fees. These tuition payments effectively subsidize the attendance of in-state students who attend public colleges at reduced rates. Foreign students and their families make these decisions because they perceive the value added of an American degree and college experience to be worth the investment. The calculus for such decision-making will shift in light of the risks associated with attending US-based institutions.

Second, the inclusion of foreign students brings perspectives, cultures, and training experiences together in a way that broadens live-learn environments. As such, the latest rule will reverberate. Foreign student visa holders include graduate students working as part of international teams of discoverers in research labs at universities all across the United States. These students benefit from our training environment while contributing to the advancement of science, research, and innovation right here. If we do not recruit and retain talented, young adults, then their talents (and ideals and perspectives) will remain elsewhere – a boon to others and a loss for us.

In pragmatic and selfish terms, the US currently welcomes students who have been vetted in competitive review processes to contribute to cutting-edge science, technology, and medical research without having had to pay the up-front costs of K-12 education abroad. What a deal! Discoveries that are made here are then more likely to lead to new inventions, technologies, startups, and the interests of US-based businesses than elsewhere. As a lab lead who has welcomed students from all over the world for over 15+ years, I view the issue of recruitment of foreign students both pragmatically and socially. Recruiting global talent enriches our research and each other. I am proud of all of our team members, whether born here or abroad. Isolating ourselves will lead to an existential crisis.

How does it help Americans and the U.S. economy to close its borders to foreign students? This is the path that the Trump administration is now walking down, whether by terminating grants and programs or targeting foreign students with ad hoc and disruptive policy changes. These attacks may start with Columbia or Harvard but they won’t end there.

Soon, foreign students may stop asking themselves: what is the best place in America to go for undergraduate or graduate school? Instead, they will ask: why come to America where students face the chaotic risk of arbitrary deportation and perhaps worse, detention, because of the capricious acts of the federal government?

What’s Next: Judicial Review & Accumulating Damage

Harvard will almost certainly fight back in the courts. It is likely to win, at least in the short-term. But the administration appears intent on continuing its attacks on Harvard specifically and higher education more broadly. Even with judicial injunctions, the damage is accumulating as measured in lost programs, grants, initiatives, experts, and expertise. All of this points to a larger fracture in civil society where the federal government increasingly decides to arbitrarily halt contracts, grants, and programs if they do not align with the administration’s priorities.

Just a few days ago, Director Michael Kratsios of the White House Office of Science, Technology and Policy spoke to the National Academy of Sciences, extolling the need for a return to “Gold Standard Science” (an issue I will return to in a future post). In doing so, Kratsios – an undergraduate politics major and former chief of staff for Peter Thiel – made the claim that “We want America’s scientists to be the best in the world.” This claim is difficult to square with ongoing attacks on higher education and research nationwide. In practice, as was made clear today, the administration appears to be doing all it can to cede leadership in science and make it harder for the best scientists in the world to continue to live, work, and discover right here in America.

Update, May 23: As expected, Harvard has sued the federal government. Lawsuit details here & the judge has already issued a temporary restraining order. Next hearing May 29.