Melissa Whatley, "Balancing Finances, Politics, & Public Health: International Student Enrollment and Reopening Plans at US Higher Education Institutions Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic"

On September 15th, at 12PM (CST), Dr. Melissa Whatley will be speaking in-person at the International and Area Studies Library 309 and on Zoom.

Drawing from resource dependence theory, Dr. Whatley explores the extent to which international student enrollment related to institutional decisions to shift to in-person instructional strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study focuses particularly on July 2020, a time during which tensions around international students’ legal status in the US were especially high. Dr. Whatley's results suggest that leaders at private not-for-profit institutions were significantly more likely to shift instructional strategies to include more in-person instruction, thus allowing more international students to enroll, but also placing at risk the health of individuals on their campuses and in their local communities. A similar result was not found for public institutions. These results speak to the extent to which private institutions in the US have become financially dependent on international students’ tuition and have clear implications for the financial futures of US higher education institutions.