Do you currently advise against America as a destination for an overseas education?[poll public=true]
Yes
No
[/poll]
This is now “The Oligarchy of 45” we are talking about. For 15+ years, I have always been supportive in my cautious advice to students about to embark on an educational sojourn to America. I can no longer, in good conscience, passively suggest tips on safety. The quagmire of their current situation has me posting figurative Do Not Enter signs at every American post. TheY’all gotta learn the hard way that Oligarch 45 is not acceptable to the rest of the world. He has the nuclear codes dude. We, the rest of the world, ARE NOT HAPPY ABOUT THIS. America is a dangerous place now. Internally and to the rest of us. Grab some statistics about how hate crimes are being perpetrated in public more often and in the name of 45. I think the rest of us should just sit back and let themY’all have their 2nd Civil War and if all TheY’all come out on the right side of history, we’ll talk more then. Until then? DO NOT ENTER.
If your students have access to the same Taiwanese deep state my wife does they’re most likely already well aware of the situation on the street in America. Therefore you run the risk of losing credibility bigtime if you try to sell them on your ‘the sky is falling!’ version of life in America these days because you’re still butthurt over the election results. My advice if you really want to join the resistance and make a difference is to try a different approach. I know the only ploys I’ve found which deter my wife once she’s on the scent are appeals to superstition, fortune telling and hints of imminent natural disaster.
I’m a US citizen, so I can’t vote on this, but I did want to point out that Canadian public schools actually cancelled school trips across the border, and advised against traveling to the US in general, after the immigration ban went into effect.
Also, I currently have a handful of students who are looking to the US for graduate programs and employment, and in general they seem undeterred by the political climate. Most are planning on moving to big cities. One, who is applying for a medical program, said that his main concerns are not VISA-related, but rather the discrimination he may face moving to smaller, more central, cities. He feels (from what he has seen in the news and from his previous trips to the country) that the US has become less tolerant towards “outsiders”, especially outside of urban areas.
If you’re drawing circles around groups of people based on whether or not they believe the same things you do, you should think deeply about why a circle needed to be drawn in the first place.
Where did all of the ridiculous terms you’re using come from? TheY’all? If you’re students have the same logic as you, then no, they shouldn’t study in the US. American colleges already have enough crazy sensationalists ruining the campus for the rest of them. If there are reasons not to study in the US, the toxic campus culture and crazy sociology professors would be valid ones. We don’t really care if you’re not happy about our democratically elected president. But if Trump being president means less foreign students applying for Pell grants to study lesbian dance theory, then that’s fine by me.
I think, regardless of your personal political stance, the most sound advice a teacher can give their students with regards to studying abroad is simply to do their own research. Any student looking to study abroad should do their research on the country they’re about to enter. Political climates don’t always effect a student’s choice to study abroad. As teachers, we cannot make the case of “you shouldn’t go there” unless we have concrete evidence that the student will not receive a good education, or they will be in actual danger, or a combination of the two. (Not to say either of those things are warnings you should give a student wanting to go to the US.)
If a student does their research and decides, “Whoa, no way, that’s crazy, I’m not going to go there,” that’s their decision. Alternatively, if they, like many, do their research and say, “You know, I still want to pursue an education at ___ because, in the end, it will benefit my education/career/etc,” that’s also their decision.