International student enrollment dropped more than 30 percent across the U.S. and 16 percent at AU since 9-11, according to a new study.
The Institute of International Education, the student and faculty exchange organization that administers the Fulbright Program, conducted the study this year.
The study mainly attributed the decline to the changes in the visa application process.
Additional factors to the reduction "financial difficulties and students' attraction to other host countries," the study said.
U.S. college enrollment has especially dropped among students from Middle Eastern countries, with Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates among those most affected.
"We definitely have seen a decline in the enrollment of international students," said Fanta Aw, director of International Student Services at AU. "The waiting period for visas ... and the economic downturn in the United States has impacted their willingness to enroll."
AU junior Vanessa Adande, from the central African country of Gabon, said, "For everything that we're paying for, we're being mistreated for what other people have done. It's not fair."
The study observed slight increases in enrollment of international students from Kenya, India, Korea and China. This did not significantly outweigh the decline of students.
For example, schools participating in the study noted a 29 percent decline in the number of students admitted from Saudi Arabia this fall.
New regulations in the registration process, such as fingerprinting, have led students to obtain their education in other countries abroad, such as the United Kingdom, where registration policies are less stringent.
According to the new visa guidelines, some countries with a high population of Muslims have been targeted for enforcement of the new visa process because authorities have pinpointed terrorist activities arising out of those regions.
Garrison Courtney, spokesman for the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security, told The Chronicle of Higher Education that the registration process is not meant to profile Arab students.
"It's that Al Qaeda is operating there or some other terrorist organizations in the country are posing a threat to the U.S.," Courtney said.
