US proposes $100,000 charge for international students to do postgraduate work – Nature

US proposes $100,000 charge for international students to do postgraduate work  Nature

Suggested change to immigration rules would choke off a crucial STEM talent pipeline, policy specialists say. Dan Garisto is a freelance reporter in Syracuse, New York. Universities in the United States would have to pay as much as US$100,000 for one of their international graduates to work in the country after their education under a new federal proposal. Credit: Getty International students in the United States would incur a US$100,000 price tag to work in US science after graduation under a proposal made public on 7 October by the administration of US President Donald Trump. The proposed rule would require academic institutions to foot the bill for a work programme called optional practical training (OPT), which allows overseas students to work in the United States for up to three years after finishing an undergraduate or postgraduate degree.

Roughly one-third of the 1.2 million international students in the United States participated in OPT in the 2025–26 academic year, making it the largest pipeline of global talent into the US workforce. International PhD students to face strict limits on time in the US The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which issued the proposed rule, stated that it is meant to “combat fraud, strengthen the integrity of the immigration system and protect US workers”. The DHS projected that if the rule was