evren@wuibc.UUCP (Evren Senol) (12/14/88)
In article <2521@udccvax1.acs.udel.EDU> kathyp@vax1.acs.udel.EDU (Kathy Pividal) writes: > The quotas are not to protect the American students but the American Tax >payers. Many of the foreign students (graduate) are not only benefitting >from the American educational system but are being supported (tuition >and stipend) by American federal agencies (NSF, DoD, DoE, NIH, etc.). >Because of the new tax law, I (an American Graduate student) have to pay >the US goverment taxes on my stipend, however the foreign students on >student visas pay no taxes to the US government even though their source >and amount of funding is identical to mine. Explain why this is not financial >discrimination against American students. I have been following the conversation going on about the foreign students. First of all I would like to mention that I am one of those foreign students who was (and still is) lucky enough to get educated in an American university for the last six and a half years. I know that the issue of foreign students and specially foreign engineering students is a complex one with many sides to it. However, I would like to share some of my thoughts on this with you. (This will actually make me think about the situation once again!!!) 1. Kathy Pividal is DEAD WRONG when she says that foreign students do not have to pay taxes. On the contrary, there is a discrimination against foreign students in that they are not allowed even to take the $2500.00 (the amount may be somewhat off) exemption that Americans are entitiled to on their 1040 forms. They can only claim $1200.00 (again the amount may be off a bit) personal exemption. So, as I foreign student I actually paid more in taxes than a single American student would have. However, there is one special situation that applies not only to students alone but to other foreigners as well no matter what their reasons to be in the U.S. are. That is, there are *Tax Treaties* that are signed between the U.S. government and other governments involved that allow individuals from those countries that have a treaty with the U.S. to be exempt from paying taxes. The amount of exemption varies from something like $1000.00 to total income. I think students from China can claim all of their income exempt. Remember though that the American citizens who work in these countries also get tax breaks. 2. At this moment, as I am typing this response, I do not have the statistics with me but I think I can find them if necessary. The statistics I am talking about show that, contrary to popular belief, there are a LARGE number of foreign students, both undergraduate or graduate, who actually PAY their way. The U.S. universities actually make money off of these foreign students. I am not saying that the universities should not do that, all I am saying is that there doesn't exist a situation whereby the U.S. universities are losing money over foreign students. 3. The U.S. has a LOT more to gain from these foreign students than to lose. As mentioned in the previous discussions a way for a foreign student to gain permanent residency (get a Green Card) is to pursue a doctorate degree in order to qualify for a job that few other Americans are qualified for. So, if a foreign student is so qualified as to get permanent residency, then he or she will be part of the American work force and thus actually help the U.S. to develop. And at the point that he or she obtains permanent residency the label of *foreigner* will not be an issue. On the other hand, if that person leaves the U.S. after getting all the education he or she can, after getting used to the *American way of living*, getting all the American ideals and thoughts, there is a much much greater probability that whereever the person goes, he or she will be a strong proponent of American ideas. This will effectively make them many ambassodors of the U.S all around the world. If you add to this the fact that most of those people get high level government or private jobs when they return to their home countries, I think the benefit to the U.S. is obvious. 4. As mentioned before, about half of the doctorate students in the U.S are foreign nationals. If you, the Americans, think that there is something wrong with this, please look no further. MOST of the fault lies in the American society. Other than not getting much recognition for getting a doctorate degree, the FINANCIAL opportunities at Master's or even at Bachelors degree level is SO high that any person would easily be deceived to forget about higher education and start making money. It takes a LOT of courage to forget about $30,000.00 a year, work for about $10,000.00 a year on an assistantship of some sorts (if you are luck) and pay in the order of $10,000.00 a year in tuition. 5. The Congress and the President of the U.S. were out of their minds when they passed the new tax bill requiring graduate students (American or foreign) to pay taxes not only on their stipends but also on the TUITION remission they receive. (As an example, I would be required to pay taxes on tuition remission I receive for up to $2000.00 a year!!!) As if the graduate student salaries were enough to live on, now we will all get MUCH less to survive on. This is all the more reason for Americans not to go to graduate school, and I CANNOT blame them. 6. I am sure there are other points that I have not mentioned, but this article is long enough for the time being.... Evren Senol evren@wuibc.wustl.edu __________________________________________________________________________ I know that you believe that you understand what you think I said, BUT I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant! __________________________________________________________________________
reggie@pdn.UUCP (George W. Leach) (12/15/88)
In article <349@wuibc.UUCP> evren@wuibc.UUCP (Evren Senol) writes: > The U.S. has a LOT more to gain from these foreign students than to lose. I agree! If nothing else US universities benefited financially. During times when the number of American students graduating from high school declined, universities were able to make up for the reduced enrollments with foreign students. Remember there was a time period where a drop off in the birth rate (after the baby boom) eventually caused this situation. I'm not sure if we are still in that situation or not? It has been my experience, as a student, teacher and professional that the foreign students, for the most part, are a positive influence. Sure there are exceptions, but my feeling is that the average foreigh student is more likely to be prepared to work towards their eventual goals than their American counterparts. And I agree with Mr. Senol that in order to understand the reason for this, we should not be looking at the foreign students, but at the American students! > If you, the Americans, think that there is something wrong with this > [refering to the proportion of doctoral students who are foreigners], > please look no further. MOST of the fault lies in the American society. How many freshman coming into a university have even considered anything beyond a bachelor degree? I would guess that not many have. Most are lucky if by that time in their life they have figured out waht they want to do. High schools do not do an adequate job of educating our youth on the possibilities in careers. And most parents don't exactly devote much time to this either. Sure we ask our kids when they are little: "what do you want to be when you grow up"? But as they approach the end of their high school days, how much are they aware of what opportunities there are in this world? Ideally, a high school student could become exposed to a wide variety of fields and careers, be able to choose one that interestes them, and then have the ability to select the best university programs to aid in reaching that goal. Unfortunately, it is my impression that this rarely happens. I know in my case that I was fortunate that in 1974 my high school installed an old Teletype with a paper tape punch and offered a course in BASIC. This experience steered me towards Computer Science. However, I never thought of graduate school until I was in industry and working for a few years. And even when I did enroll in a graduate program, I did so for the wrong reasons. Eventually, my attitudes towards education changed. -- George W. Leach Paradyne Corporation ..!uunet!pdn!reggie Mail stop LG-129 Phone: (813) 530-2376 P.O. Box 2826 Largo, FL USA 34649-2826
evren@wuibc.UUCP (Evren Senol) (12/18/88)
One more point about foreign students that I would like to raise. People have been talking about the *tax* money spent on foreign students while they attend American universities. Well, there is one more side to that, which is the *tax* money spent on these students by their countries over 12 to 18 years (grade school to college graduate with MS). After other countries spend that much money to educate their citizens, the U.S. gets the BEST QUALIFIED ones for graduate studies. Most likely, if the U.S. were to educate American to the same degree, a lot more money would need to be spent since a great percentage of the students would just be *average* ones as opposed to the *more qualified* foreign ones. So, the U.S. is actually saving tax money by not having to educate a large number of Americans and choose the best ones for graduate studies. The ease of being able to pick the best qualified foreign students from all over the world may be contributing to the lack of interest or concrete action by the U.S. to better its education from grade school onward. Evren Senol evren@wuibc.wustl.edu __________________________________________________________________________ I know that you believe that you understand what you think I said, BUT I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant! __________________________________________________________________________
matloff@bizet.Berkeley.EDU (Norman Matloff) (12/21/88)
In article <350@wuibc.UUCP> evren@wuibc.UUCP (Evren Senol) writes: >The ease of being able to pick the best qualified foreign students from all >over the world may be contributing to the lack of interest or concrete >action by the U.S. to better its education from grade school onward. It's not nearly so simple as this. In my activities as Graduate Adviser in CS here at UC Davis, I expend 100 times more effort per student on foreign students than on domestic students. Many of the problems are financial. Students from China and India typically have no personal funds at all to draw upon, and there's still a money problem with students from other countries, in the sense that I have to come up with good financial support in order to compete in a "bidding war" with other schools for the best students. And of course these problems are compounded by the fact that foreign students pay much more tuition than domestic students at UC. Also, foreign students often have visa problems to deal with. Also, there is the problem of making sure that the foreign students who are TA's do a good job, both in absolute terms and also in perceived terms (many Americans are not very tolerant of foreign accents, even if the person's meaning is clear). Sometimes cultural conflicts, e.g. sexism, cheating, etc. occur (of course, these occur with Americans too, but they are often perceived as being more conspicuous if a foreign student is involved, and the frequency **does** tend to be higher), and I am called upon to smooth things out. And, of course, there is the fact that our Graduate Division will give me a worried call if I admit more foreign students than the quota they've set, and I am constantly having to fight with them every time they make a new policy regarding foreign students. So your use of the word "ease" is totally misleading. It's nice that we get all the best foreign students from each country to apply, and thus we can "pick and choose" as you say (our CS grad admissions rate is under 3%), but each one of those students represents a tremendous amount of work, both at admissions time and later after enrollment -- FAR from being "ease". So why DOESN'T the U.S. do something? I think the simple truth is that they (I assume you mean government) JUST DON'T KNOW ABOUT IT. Oh, sure, once in a while, there is a newspaper story about the Japanese kids' test scores are higher than ours, or the fact that a majority of doctorates in engineering go to foreign students, but unless you really OBSERVE it, you aren't really aware of it. Most of us who read this newsgroup are in either technical academia or in the computer/electronics industry, so we see this phenomenon every day. But the people in the government don't. Norm