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From: siegman@sierra.Stanford.EDU (Anthony E. Siegman)
Newsgroups: comp.edu,sci.math,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Student and Course Integrity  (was Rising cost of textbooks)
Message-ID: <26@sierra.stanford.edu>
Date: 14 Dec 88 00:30:06 GMT
References: <1131@osupyr.mast.ohio-state.edu> <1887@sun.soe.clarkson.edu> <18121@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <1060@l.cc.purdue.edu> <18144@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <5653@sdcsvax.UCSD.EDU> <9156@smoke.BRL.MIL>
Reply-To: siegman@sierra.UUCP (Anthony E. Siegman)
Organization: Stanford University
Lines: 18

The Electrical Engineering Department at Stanford, which takes in a very
large group of new MS candidates (about 200) each Autumn, controls its
admission process to limit foreign students to about 20% of that group.
This seems to us a reasonable compromise between all the conflicting
factors [industrial supporters who charge we're devoting our resources
to foreign students at the expense of U.S. candidates, people who say
we're brain-draining overseas countries, our own desire to be an
internationally significant institution, people who argue for a pure
merit-based system, people who say we're benefiting the U.S. by bringing
excellent students here from all around the world, etc.]

Foreign students stay on beyond the MS degree in much greater proportions
than U.S. students, however, so our PhD cohort (about 60-65 PhD degrees
per year) is more like 50% foreign, perhaps even higher.

Personally, I see so many factors both pro and con concerning foreign
graduate students (more pro than con, in my judgment) that I think some
reasonable middle-ground compromise such as what we now do is the only
reasonable decision.