ICE agrees to rescind rules requiring international students to be enrolled in in-person classes

The federal government yesterday agreed to rescind rules announced by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement last week ordering international students in the country to transfer schools or leave the country if their current school decided on an online-only class schedule for the fall. The decision was announced just as a federal court hearing in Massachusetts was getting underway for a lawsuit brought by Harvard and MIT. As I wrote last week, the fate of nearly a million undergraduate and graduate students in the U.S. was up in the air, and many were contemplating next steps if they were forced to leave. One of them, Penn State doctoral student Hridya Rao, shared that yesterday's news comes as a relief. "[I] was under a lot of stress the past few week, and while my department was so helpful in changing my courses to fit the guidelines, I am so happy [ICE] agreed to rescind [the rules]."