Colorado Technical University

Why are 55% of U.S. doctorates awarded to foreign students?

In 2002/2003, the majority of U.S. doctorate degrees in engineering were awarded to foreign students - 55%. A positive trend that has occurred between 1983 and 2003 is that women and american minorities in engineering have increased steadily. But even they don't hold a *candle* to the pace at which foreigners in engineering have increased. All these doctoral students are supported primarily by NSF and NIH grants - which come from federal funds and arise from american tax dollars. So how come we're allocating such an enormous portion of our resources to educating temporary foreign students? All things in moderation - I think it's great to bring in a diverse student population from all across the world. But 55% of all doctoral students? And why are India and China so overrepresented at our universities? Why not Brazil? Or South Africa? Or Greece? It's almost as if we were training the workforce of India and China, to enable large corporations to offshore operations to these countries. Makes me paranoid.

Public Comments

1. Because 55% of the time, foreign doctoral students are smarter than American doctoral students.
2. The US has the most and overall the best doctoral programs in the world. Most students want to come here to do their degree. And many of them are much better students than our own - they had better schools growing up and they have a much better work ethic. There are a number of Brazilians here as well - Brazil will pay for them to do their PhD in the US as long as they go back to Brazil when they're done. As for China and India, well, overall the population there has a higher IQ than many other nations, and you have to be smart to get into a PhD program.
3. Many of these foreign students want to work in the USA. The PhD (and MEng) is the minimum ticket for them to attract a USA employer. USA engineers are already competitive in the USA because they already have a degree in Engineering. It's probably not true that foreign students are "crowding out" USA students. These foreign students are fairly broadly spread out among all graduate Engineering schools - prestigious and pedestrian. The decline in USA Engineering students follows from the decline in USA industry. Fix that, and make industry glamorous again, and USA students will start flooding into Engineering again. (OTOH, American students tend to make terrible/stupid choices in undergrad Majors, so maybe they won't make rational choices...).
4. Unfortunately, that is true. Having studied engineering at the graduate level, I got accustomed to being a minority in my own classrooms - where 40% were chinese, 40% indian, and 20% were american. It is disappointing. I don't think there is a problem with opening our educational system to foreigners. But I agree that it should be done in a more equal way - bring in students representing all corners of the world, not just two countries. The matter of funding is in itself a tricky issue. In my department, the three american students I knew of had to beg for the same funding awarded to foreign students. I myself was completely unfunded throughout the duration of my graduate studies. My experience is that these foreign students are no brighter than american students. Some of them work a lot harder than americans, but only a few. A surprising number of them did not spend *that* much time studying or working in the lab. I think the real reason american universities love these students is because they are cheap, and because they can overwork them to the brink of a nervous breakdown. Consider that as a doctoral student you are officially a university employee, and given ~$18,000/year as a stipend + health insurance (bringing it to ~$20K). Assuming the average time you spend in the lab is 60 hours/week, that comes down to $6.4/hour. And the money is the least of all evils - considering you are tormented by your academic adviser throughout the duration of your studies. No intelligent american kid would subject him/herself through this torment. The only americans that remain are those that lacked the common sense to see the bad deal they were getting - and because the hard facts and numbers aren't readily available, and because the Discovery Channel shows on the space shuttle, semiconductors and biotechnology were so persuasive, these few americans continued on to a PhD. Only to get to the end of the line and realize that there is such a bottleneck of PhDs they can't effectively compete for the few jobs out there. The real question is "why are so many americans pursuing a doctorate in engineering? Why 45% and why not much, much fewer?" I stick to my point that it takes a special breed to do a doctorate - someone who can diggest complex math and science, but someone too stupid to ask "why" and "for whom" and "what about me". When you're overworking yourself for $6.4/hour and treated like a modern-day sweatshop worker, I think that last question warrants some attention.
5. Foreign doctoral candidates are accepted by universities for two main reasons. First is that there are not sufficient qualified US applicants for the amount of research work the university has accepted contracts to fulfill. And universities want the very best candidates and they do not care where they came from. Next is that in many cases the foreign students are not getting a free ride but are paying for it or having a company or foreign government paying for it in order to gain expertise. The schools can use these funds to subsidize US students. There are so many from some countries as those countries educational systems turn out more qualified people. Not Brazil because because of the educational system there. Africa even more so. Not from places like Greece as there are plenty of good universities in Europe. Chinese students are well represented as their country's schools turn out qualified people and some of the very best are selected to go to the USA and Canada to what the Chinese feel are the best schools in the world because the Chinese value education more than any other people in the world. My Canadian daughter is getting her PhD in engineering at a top university on a full ride because she is recognized during her graduate fellowship in Washington DC as one of the most brilliant people in her field to come along in years. Her PhD was arranged by people in DC and she had her choice of top schools. And while she is working with many offshore PhD students, she has to all the work involving interacting with Americans as she is the only PhD student there that is a native English speaker and she can interact with Americans better. And since her work involves US geography, she knows the country better than most native born Americans. While her school is still in the top 50 it seems the Ivies grab the most brilliant US citizens and the rest of the smart ones go either into medicine, law or finance, hoping to make a killing with Goldman Sachs.