The GLOBE Program, a student organization within the Carlson School of Management, supports incoming exchange students and guides them as they adjust to living in Minnesota. The Globe program observed a drop in exchange student enrollments as they are concerned about Trump’s immigration policies.
The program currently has 43 exchange students this semester, supporting exchange students by offering a buddy system and hosting events for the students.
Globe program manager Kate Johnson said she helps exchange students adapt to life and academics at the University of Minnesota.
“My role is to support them with acclimating to Minnesota, registering for courses and helping connect them with visa support,” Johnson said.
According to U.S. News, President Donald Trump’s administration removed international student visas for attending a protest and minor offenses such as traffic violations.
At the University, Turkish international student Doğukan Gunaydin was detained last March due to a DWI from 2023, according to the Minnesota Daily.
As the Trump administration cracks down on international students entering the United States, Johnson said many universities within the U.S. face struggles with the immigration policies.
“I think not just the Carlson school, but the entire University of Minnesota campus and just higher-ed institutions across the United States are experiencing a lot of difficulties with this,” Johnson said. “Not only with restrictive policies but also just the uncertainty about time, uncertainty about impact and just makes it really challenging to plan ahead.”
Co-president Jonathan Davisson said one of Globe’s main focuses is building connections among students.
“Our big emphasis is essentially on fostering those longer-term connections for people to be able to say ‘I have friends from all over the world’ and to be able to point at a map and think ‘Ok, if I go to that country, I could visit that person,” Davisson said. “I think that’s the deeper sense of community, beyond just providing resources is a lot of what we try to focus on with Globe.”
Davisson said he believes enrollment of exchange students at Globe has dropped due to student concerns about Trump’s immigration policy.
“What we found last semester is that we got a list, and then it slowly dwindled as a lot of that policy was coming out as people were having trouble getting their visas or they were just genuinely too afraid to come to the U.S. for one reason or another,” Davisson said. “We had a lot of our international students sort of afraid or very uncertain about what their role would be here.”
A Swiss exchange student in the program said it is best to ignore the current situation with international students.
“I feel like it might be a positive thing to just ignore what’s happening because we cannot do that much, especially the exchange students,” she said.
The student said she hopes to see people openly discuss the current events surrounding international students.
“I just hope to see that people here can have a normal discourse that are not as polarized and can just talk about what’s happening,” she said. “I hope that the opportunities to come study in the United States will still exist and the administration supports these programs.”
Marketing Vice President Bella Lewis said every summer, there are some international students who decide not to study abroad in Minnesota, as they could be dealing with issues, including their visas.
“There were some international students who didn’t end up coming, but I don’t know the reasons for that,” Lewis said. “There’s always different reasons, maybe some were visa, but otherwise people don’t want to come, or Minnesota was their fifth choice.”
Editor’s Note: The name of a student was removed for security concerns.
Correction: The name of the student program was misstated. The correct name of the program is the GLOBE Program, a student-run Campus Life Program that works with the Carlson Global Institute at Minnesota Carlson.
