Visa delays and funding cuts are hampering efforts to increase international education opportunities for outbound students to the US, NAFSA delegates heard.

The US Department of State has adjusted its study visa guidance for consular officers who approve visas for prospective international students around intent to leave – a move that stakeholders have welcomed.

Traffickers around the world are targeting international students to exploit them for forced labour and sex work, the US State Department’s latest Trafficking in Persons report has found. 

Select international students intending to arrive in the US for studies in 2021 will be eligible for interview waivers, the government has said.

The numbers of US outbound students joining study abroad programs for academic credit rose 1.6% in the 2018/19 academic year.

Deep cuts to the State Department’s educational exchange programs outlined in the White House's proposed 2018 budget would damage the US’s soft power diplomacy, education organisations have warned.

Proposed plans to introduce ‘extreme vetting’ for some would-be travellers to the US, if implemented, will also damage higher education and research collaboration, educational and scientific organisations have said.

New developments from the State Department's study abroad branch include a MOOC to help institutions to internationalise.