New DHS rule stirs concern at higher ed campuses

A new rule announced last month by the Department of Homeland Security is causing confusion and anxiety among international students and faculty at Rochester’s higher education institutions.

The new rule marks the end of DHS’ longstanding policy allowing international students to remain in the country for as long as it takes to complete their degrees. Starting Sept. 15, international college students will only be allowed to remain in the U.S. on F-1 or J-1 visas for exactly four years, after which visa holders will be required to apply for an extension of stay with Customs and Immigration Services. 

The F-1 visa is a non-immigrant visa for foreign students, while the J-1 applies to foreign researchers, scholars, and professors participating in cultural exchange programs in the U.S.

“There is a lot of anxiety among F-1 students about how the new (rule) will be implemented and what it means in specific, individual circumstances,” says Amit Batabyal, interim director of the Golisano Institute for Sustainability and professor of economics at Rochester Institute of Technology.

Faculty members also are worried about the impact of the new rule. 

“There are significant concerns about what the new (rule) will mean for programs such as ours (in the Sustainability Department) where as much as 50% of the entering class can be made up of international students,” Batabyal says. “What we are losing out is the welcoming nature of our graduate programs to talented international students and the negative spillover effects on recruiting new students in subsequent years.”

International students play a significant role in enrollment at local universities. At RIT, nearly 1,530 students from 112 countries were welcomed last fall. The University of Rochester had over 3,000 international students. Foreign students typically pay full tuition.

URochester is still navigating the upcoming changes internally, a spokesperson said, declining to comment further. For now, international students are directed to the school’s duration-of-status guidance page online or invited to attend some of the school’s webinars covering the changes.

On Aug. 18, NAFSA, an association of international educators, filed suit against DHS over the new requirements and asked for an injunction to halt implementation of the new rule.

In a press release announcing the lawsuit, Fanta Aw, NAFSA’s executive director, summarized the reasoning for the litigation.

“Ending Duration of Status and imposing new limits on academic decision-making is a solution in search of a problem,” Aw stated. “The rule will severely undermine the contributions international students make to U.S. campuses, economies, and national security. After carefully reviewing the final rule and the sweeping harm it will cause to our national interest, it is clear that litigation is warranted and necessary.”

F-1 and J-1 visa holders are the primary target of the new regulation. F-1 visa holders include both international students in higher education and students in the U.S. for language instruction.

The extension-of-stay application, which is reviewed by USCIS, may require F-1 and J-1 visa holders to be interviewed by the agency to renew their visas. Applicants may also be required to submit biometric and personal information to the agency, as well as submit evidence for why they require an extension.

In a statement announcing the rule change, DHS said the EOS application transitions oversight from university staff back to federal authorities and subjects applicants to biometric vetting, background checks, and fraud screenings.

Batabyal notes that, contrary to DHS’ framing, universities never had ultimate authority over a visa holder’s immigration status. However, they did have an outsized operational role. If a student requested additional time to complete their studies, designated university officials would evaluate their circumstances and, if necessary, would update that student’s immigration forms and notify DHS through the agency’s Student & Exchange Visitor Information System or SEVIS.

“(Under the old rule) the student did not normally have to ask USCIS for an extension of stay. The federal government therefore relied heavily on the university’s ongoing reporting and certification system,” says Batabyal. “That is what DHS means by moving oversight back to federal authorities. The new system puts a USCIS adjudication between the university’s recommendation and the student’s continued legal stay.”

Additionally, the new rule imposes strict limitations on academic changes and reduces the time available to visa holders to leave the country, transfer schools, or change their visa status from 60 days to 30 days. F-1 visa holders in the U.S. for language instruction are also subject to restrictions that require an extension of stay after only two years of studying in the US.

Critics argue that the new four-year limit is unreasonable.

According to data published in 2017 by the National Center for Education Statistics, the most recent data available, only about 44% of students manage to complete a bachelor’s degree within the 48-month window, often changing majors or having to retake courses before completing their degree. Graduate programs almost always require more than four years to complete, as well as a period of “optional practical training,” or work experience, to complement their education.

The addition of an in-person interview with USCIS, which may include the collection of personal and biometric data, to the process of extending a student’s visa creates what Batabyal describes as “a double-layer bureaucracy.”

“This is particularly awkward because the issues that determine whether a PhD student needs another six months are often academic issues—a dissertation took longer than expected, an experiment failed, a research project changed, a faculty adviser left, funding was delayed, etc.,” says Batabyal. “The rule does not eliminate university oversight; it adds federal adjudication on top of university oversight. That may strengthen federal control, but it does not necessarily make the system simpler.”

According to DHS, the new rule will not limit foreign students from completing their degree requirements, and it says that common causes of late graduation could be considered grounds for an EOS. Still, lack of clarity and tightened immigration laws are likely to have an impact on a foreign student’s decision to study in the U.S.

Critics argue that stricter policies, one example of the Trump administration’s tightening grip on both higher education and immigration, could be causing a brain drain, or the decline in educated professionals and academics in the workforce. 

A survey by NAFSA noted a 17% decline in international student enrollment in fall 2025, while in March the British Council reported declining U.S. international student enrollment and increasing opportunities for competing destinations such as the U.K.

“International students experience immigration policy as a single environment,” Batabyal says. “From their perspective, these policies collectively answer the question: ‘How welcome and secure will I be if I come to the United States?’ That is why the cumulative effect may be considerably larger than the effect of any individual regulation. 

“For a university such as RIT,” he adds, “I would regard this as a strategic competitiveness issue as well as an immigration compliance issue.”

DHS contends that the traditional F-1 and J-1 visa regulations have been exploited by foreign students, who have taken advantage of lax restrictions on the length of their stay in the country.

“By implementing clear, finite limits on these visas, the United States is reclaiming its ability to properly screen, vet, and monitor individuals within our borders,” said Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin when announcing the changes. “This final rule ensures that foreign students remain focused on their primary purpose: completing their studies and returning home.”

To support its claim, the agency cites the reported 2,100 foreign students who arrived in the U.S. between 2000 and 2010 and who remain in the country on F-1 visas, as well as numerous cases of alleged fraud and espionage prosecuted against student visa holders and visa mills. According to a 2010 report from the visa office, between 2006 and 2010, over 1.6 million people were issued F-1 visas. A similar report cites over 1.7 million students who were issued F-1 visas between 2020 and 2024.

“DHS has identified genuine vulnerabilities in the F-1 system,” Batabyal says. “The policy question is whether those vulnerabilities are sufficiently widespread to justify imposing substantially greater administrative costs on millions of legitimate students, universities and federal agencies.”

Echoing points raised by Batabyal in its lawsuit against DHS, NAFSA argues that SEVIS already represents a significant compliance system for international students. Through SEVIS, school officials who work with F-1 and J-1 students are required to regularly report their status to maintain their eligibility for DHS’ student exchange program.

Nationwide, universities have also raised concerns about increased wait times and bureaucratic overload in the EOS application process. In fiscal 2026, USCIS’ median processing time of EOS applications was 3.3 months. However, in June 2025, processing times were as high as 9.6 months, according to an American Association of Universities report, which predicts a 163% increase in applications following the implementation of the new rules.

In its entry in the Federal Register outlining the reasoning behind the new rules, DHS responds directly to the AAAU comment and others concerned about processing time,

“DHS believes that the benefits of increased contact with these nonimmigrants (during the EOS application process) outweigh processing time considerations,” the statement reads. “DHS understands the importance of timely processing and strives to adjudicate applications as efficiently as possible. 

“However, processing times can be affected by a variety of factors, including security vetting requirements and the need for thorough review to ensure program integrity. That is why nonimmigrants are always encouraged and will continue to be encouraged to apply well in advance of the expiration of their stay so that their EOS can be timely adjudicated and not cause any disruption to their programs.”

DHS’ Federal Register entry offers similar solutions that place the onus on visa holders and their educational institutions to keep up with the complex, rapidly changing rules, and raises even more issues, critics say.

In its legal challenge, NAFSA cites AAU’s numbers on EOS application time, arguing that DHS failed to adequately address these concerns.

“DHS insisted no ‘additional safeguards are needed in this rule.’ But DHS provided no explanations or specifics, instead simply remarking that ‘DHS is continuing to explore operational alternatives to address USCIS backlogs. … These conclusory assurances that DHS has it under control—in other words, that DHS will forge ahead without a clear plan—are hallmarks of arbitrary and capricious decisionmaking.”

Batabyal says communication between federal authorities and universities on navigating the new requirements has been one of the weakest parts of the rollout.

“Universities have received the rule itself, DHS’ explanatory materials and FAQs, and professional guidance from organizations such as NAFSA. But university international offices are themselves saying that important implementation questions remain unanswered,” says Batabyal, citing statements from Yale and Stanford as examples.

“There certainly are existing channels through which universities communicate with federal immigration agencies—SEVP/SEVIS, stakeholder engagements, professional associations, USCIS outreach, etc.,” he adds. “But I have not found evidence of a new system in which local USCIS field offices are systematically coordinating one-on-one with university international student offices about the implementation of this rule. That is an important distinction. The university’s international office is an advisor and intermediary, not a local USCIS branch office.”

David Wazana is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer and a member of the Oasis Project’s second cohort. 

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