And over here in my university in the UK half of the students are Chinese and most of the ones that I talked with plan to continue their studies and careers here and in the US. What you claim goes both ways.
I'm not sure I understand the argument of the article. Yes my graduate classes have many Chinese students in them, but why exactly is it bad that they are furthering their education and doing research in the US? The biggest issue I see is that many of them want to live and work in the US after graduation, but basically have to leave it up to luck in the visa lottery system.
Fair point. As someone who grew up here in America, I’m sure my perspective is somewhat different compared to my international student counterparts.
But based on my anecdotal experience, the majority of my international peers want to stay in the Bay Area after they graduate, or at least somewhere comparable like Seattle, New York, etc.
Also it’s not just them either, their parents also want them to stay in America. There’s a reason why they’re willing to pay exorbitant amounts of money every year to fund their children’s education here. This is true by the way for pretty much the entirety of the world, not just singling out China.
Just my personal anecdote but a vast majority of the Chinese students I've known do not want to stay after their degree. A couple have rattled off the statistics on the huge advantage they have in the job market back home with a degree from the US.
Not that I'm arguing against immigration reform, though. Just playing devil's advocate.
Also, literally every student I've met in China wants to go to the US. Undergraduates want to do their Master's there, Master's students want to do their PhD, I guess PhD students want to become professors at a US university.
Even that is changing. I know of a masters course in a UK Russell group uni where Chinese students outnumber any other group including locals. The result of this is terrible, terrible English skills and huge pressure from the "sales" department to give better grades to keep that sweet Chinese money flowing. Essays written in broken English that suddenly and suspiciously transition into perfect prose are common and no longer punished. When one of the students was asked why they picked that course at that uni, they said it was because the entry requirements were easiest and the level of English required was low.
Now, obviously, this course at this uni is clearly going to crash and burn at some point, having used up all good will pandering to rich Chinese students. The problem is that this is an industry race to the bottom. Sure, the main stem subjects at Cambridge or Manchester are in good shape, but all the fringe subjects are going to shit, especially the one year masters courses.
I can't name the specific course or university as I was told this in confidence by a faculty member, so believe what you will, but the race to the bottom is happening and is causing immense harm to UK institutions at all levels, not just the ex-poly degree mills.
If you were a young Chinese person, why would you study in an American university?
Under normal circumstances you would want to see America. You would want to be with the best to get a bit of paper at the end from a top notch place. The world would then be your oyster. You would know people, you would know what America is like and how nice American people are (under normal circumstances).
But what happens if you know you won't be welcomed? What if you had got wind of this hysteria going on?
You go somewhere else.
It might not be America but at least you could do your degree without people muttering 'Chinese Whispers' (!) about how you are there just to harvest people's IP and steal their state organs.
If English is the language to learn then there are plenty of universities in England that will gladly take Chinese money. The hysteria hasn't sullied the atmosphere in the UK yet. Then there are Scandinavian countries, Germany and other places where you get English going on in science subjects. Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada are good options too.
Then there are the non-English speaking countries that roll the red carpet out for China. Anything belt and road. Russia. There are plenty of places. Now there are options and the idea of studying in the U.S. is not really looking that exciting. Plus, the more you look into it there can be better places to get a particular degree than one of the Ivy League big names.
This could precipitate a serious decline in the international standing of U.S. universities. If departments are not getting the big bucks coming in from Chinese admissions they will have to get students from elsewhere. The bar gets lowered in the process and it becomes a downward spiral.
The only American cars of interest internationally are the ones by Tesla. Nobody wants an American car. In Europe we used to imitate American cars albeit cut down to cheap size. But, nowadays, Tesla aside, nobody in Europe would consider an American car as a serious proposition. And there isn't anything Detroit can do to change that.
If American academia gets to go in a similar downward spiral then there is no way back out of it. American universities could become the preserve of American rich kids with no intake from Asia or elsewhere. Then the ambitious U.S. students would have to be studying in Europe to get an education that was a cut above, or, even in China!
This is a slippery slope that we are on, all because of a minority that want to forego hospitality, trust, warmth and international spirit and succumb to fear, nationalism, hysteria and rumour-mongering.
The difference is circumstances aren't forcing the Chinese educated elite to come elsewhere, like my parents, as opportunity exists in China. Even if the probability of success is worse, the question is if the disparity is great enough to outweigh leaving family, friends, and cultural ties behind? Plenty of grad and undergrads are coming to the USA, pit-stopping in the international student community for a few years before heading right back to China. The major bottleneck in China right now is higher level education as many are still compiling resources after getting totally fucked by the government in the Cultural Revolution only 2 generations ago. This is being rapidly solved as the initial generations post Cultural Revolution reach maturity and we will see this differential close in this next generation. My observation is concurrent with the fact that Asian immigration has been significantly slowing both in raw numbers and % wise within the last 10 years, China doesn't have to beat the West, it just has to get close enough.
Trivially asserts that it will be done immediately/soon, which will never happen.
It seems we are in agreement? The Chinese grad students (who are presumably the best students, since the western universities are the best for CS) that make it to the US stay there.
There are more than a billion Chinese, and only a tiny number of them came to US for college. From such a large population pool, you can find people with all kinds of options. Even if all of those who came to US are aligned with western ideology, it really doesn't mean much.
On top of that, from what I see most of the Chinese that came to US nowadays are becoming more patriotic, and more tolerant about Chinese government before they came.
I'm from China and lived in the US for years. I think that Chinese people are way more practical and result driven, and instead Americans tend to follow their hearts more. I agree that there are many different ways to interpret ancient Chinsese philosophy that can lead to totally different conclusions. I disagree that this has anything to do with Chinese government or the increasing amount of Chinese students.
>Also, keep in mind that no matter how much you invest, studying at an American university opens the door to working in America and getting a western passport, something more and more Chinese are desperately trying to do.
I'd heard the opposite; that in recent years fewer Chinese studying in the US are staying, and that more who had stayed were returning to China, because of greater opportunities.
Also consider that Chinese people who study abroad are paying the full sticker price of a US university, so it's really not any sort of representative sample of Chinese education. Hell, paying full sticker price for a US education is a tough lift for most Americans, who have higher standard of living.
I would not agree with this. I went to an elite business school and my Chinese classmates all felt there was far more opportunity for them in China with an American education.
They’re not stupid, they look at China and see an economy growing at 6-9% a year while the US is stuck at 1-2% and they know where the growth is for the medium-term. They also see a mature American economy that can be tough to crack even for native white citizens, so its not hard to see how their chances of long-term success are much higher in China than in the US.
> Almost everyone will prefer to live in the US over China
Look at per cent of Chinese students staying in US after graduation. It's not that big, considering the student visa to working visa is the easiest legal way into US.
Indeed. Similar things have occurred in universities here in Australia. And as far as I know, universities bend over backwards because a large amount of their money comes in from international students. A lot of which happen to be Chinese.
The number of Chinese students is already already in decline for various reasons [1]. It means less money for the American universities. It also means less tensions between students in the future. I don't think it's good news for the US though.
What I am saying is that as China grows in affluence, Chinese students are able to go to university in rapidly growing numbers. Many both want to and can afford foreign schools, and the USA is one of their top choices. This is a rapidly evolving trend. If I remember correctly enrollments grew about 6% in 2006, 20% in 2007, and the preliminary numbers I saw suggested that 2008 saw substantially faster growth than that. I've also heard suggestions that 2009 is seeing about a doubling in applications going abroad.
Absolute numbers are currently fairly small and the final market size is hard to estimate. But the addition of large numbers of highly motivated students who are willing to pay top dollar should increase selectivity at good universities.
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