NAFSA Public Policy Blog

The NAFSA public policy team provides commentary and resources on a broad range of topics related to international education and policies that will create a more welcoming and globally engaged United States. Read the latest entries from NAFSA's public policy team below.

Taking Advocacy to Our Home Court

What is advocacy? Advocacy is action by one or many individuals to support and engage others for a common cause. Our action in advocacy began with NAFSA's Advocacy Day in 2015 where NAFSA Region III provided the opportunity for us to go to Capitol Hill to educate our members of Congress on
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Take Action for Dreamers

Update: June 5, 2019 By a vote of 237 to 187, seven Republicans joined 230 Democrats yesterday in passing the Dream and Promise Act ( H.R. 6) in the U.S. House of Representatives. ( Find out how your Representative voted.) The House Judiciary Committee voted recently in favor of provisions of the
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Briefing Congress: Student Visas and the Hardest Entrance Exam

NAFSA's Counsel and Director of Immigration Policy, Heather Stewart, went to Capitol Hill on March 13, 2019 to join a panel of colleagues in briefing Congress on the issues driving international students to choose to study in more competitive countries. Additionally, the panel gave evidence of the
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Right To Vote: A Privilege That I Don’t Take For Granted

Right To Vote: A Privilege That I Don’t Take For Granted I appreciated my Chinese heritage. I was born and raised in Hong Kong, a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, also known as one of the four Asian Tigers, or Little Dragons. Hong Kong is the world's 7th largest
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International Education is Not a Partisan Issue - and Congress Agrees

NAFSA’s Deputy Executive Director for Public Policy Jill Welch testified before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration yesterday. The hearing, “Student Visa Integrity: Protecting Educational Opportunity and National Security,” was chaired by Senator John Cornyn (R-TX)
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Budgeting Time for Immigration

When President Trump terminated DACA in September, he set in motion a series of events that has led to crisis and hardship for individual DACA recipients.
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Maintaining Momentum with Cuba

As we approach the 3rd anniversary of the announcement of normalization of relations between the United States and Cuba, NAFSA remains committed to our advocacy campaign directed at Congress to ensure that Americans can travel freely to Cuba .
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