It has now been 5 months since our family moved to the States to study full-time at Midwestern Seminary. Although Midwestern does have international students, the main demographic is American. On the positive, internationals feel like a novelty and therefore we get to share about our culture and country to those genuinely interested. The negative is that many are unaware of what it takes to be an international student, and how difficult it is to remain a student. For this reason, I wanted to share some of the process, not to gain any focus onto myself, but to highlight the reality of being an international student.
VISA PROCESS
Each international student needs to acquire an F1 or J1 Visa, the most popular being the F1. To obtain such a visa, evidence must be shown to prove, amongst other things, your academic background (previous transcripts), your future studies (an accredited college acceptance letter) and how you plan to finance your studies. For our family, it took 6 months to gather all the relevant information, totaling over 300 pages.
Once all the paperwork has been submitted and verified, you then register for a Visa Interview, this is done at the nearest American Consulate. For our family this meant travelling to London – several hours of travel, requiring time off work and an overnight stay! At this interview, your paperwork is once again verified, and you are questioned to determine a credible application. If denied, your process is over. If accepted, you can book your flights and prepare to move. Either way, by this point, you will likely have spent $2000.
The area that is difficult to achieve is the matter of how you plan to pay for your studies. The Consulate requires that you show you can pay for your entire first year upfront and have funds/sponsorship for the following years. It will vary depending on the college, but usually for a single student it will be circa $21,000. If you have dependents, you must increase this figure by $5000 per dependent. Therefore, for our family we had to prove $41,000. You can do this via sponsorship, cash in hand or declaring any assets you might own. Coming from a developed country, this was difficult but not impossible, try imagining how it might be from a poor country, where $41,000 is a lifetime income… In many of these cases, families take out loans in their home countries, meaning the loan AND living costs has to be paid on a monthly basis.
Oh, don’t forget about the cost of flights and travel, for a family, that’s another $10,000…
REMAINING A STUDENT
An F1 Visa is quite restrictive. The main purpose of the Visa is Academic Studies; therefore, you must be continually enrolled as a full-time student. You are only allowed to work on campus, and this is limited to 20 hours during Semester and 40 hours during the breaks. Essentially, you can only earn a limited amount of money due to the restrictions placed upon you. Dependents are granted an F2 visa, meaning they are restricted even further. F2 Visa holders are not allowed to work or receive money for any service provided (no self-employment). They are allowed to study part time, but they cannot earn income to pay for it. It would be fair to say that international students will therefore struggle financially throughout their time at college, with minimal ways to improve the situation.
International students are not given a Social Security as standard. Therefore, you cannot apply for loans, credit cards or even a monthly phone contract. If a F1 Visa holder can obtain a job on campus, they can then apply for a social security, but F2 visa holders are barred from having a Social Security.
At all times, international students must be in good standing with the college – no fail grades, no missed exams, no breaks etc. This is a general standard at a lot of colleges, but for internationals their visa is dependent on it.
CULTURE
While working out all the above, internationals need to also navigate a new culture – from understanding different transportation (everyone drives rather than walk), to figuring out different foods. It may not seem like a big deal, but a constant flow of change and differing environments often leads to stress/pressure. Some are from cultures where needs should be kept private and all charity should be refused, others publicly seek to engage with the culture to find that they have said the wrong thing or simply don’t fit it.
RESPONDING IN KINDNESS
Why tell you this? To encourage you to show great kindness toward international students. As we seek to understand how internationals come to study, and what it takes to remain, we have an opportunity to show the love of Christ in our actions and speech. On a practical level, remember that the options available to American students are not always available to international students – show kindness when this is the case.