First-time enrollment in graduate programs increased by 2.5 percent between fall 2018 and fall 2019 even while the number of applications to graduate programs dipped slightly, by 0.6 percent, according to a new survey conducted by the Council of Graduate Schools and the Graduate Record Examinations Board.

African Americans made up 12.1 percent of all first-time graduate enrollees in 2019. Yet African Americans were just 6.1 percent of all incoming graduate students at doctoral universities with very high research activities. This was only a slight improvement from 2009 when Blacks were 5.3 percent of total first-time enrollments in graduate programs at these research universities.

But students from poorer backgrounds may not be able to wait for schools to restart admissions, so they’ll pursue other careers. Suzanne Ortega with the Council of Graduate Schools said that’s bad for diversity.

“We’re disrupting the flow from a more diverse undergraduate student pipeline to a less diverse student pipeline,” she said.

The rules could hit graduate students particularly hard, as doctoral programs tend to last more than four years. More than 88,000 international students enrolled in U.S. graduate programs for the first time last fall, according to the Council of Graduate Schools. One quarter of them were pursuing doctorates rather than shorter master’s degrees or certificates.

In a 2017 Council of Graduate Schools survey, 96% of graduate school deans said their school or institution offered mental health support or crisis counseling. Still, additional CGS research has shown that schools sometimes struggle to promote these services.

Although the survey focused on the effects of the pandemic on universities, it is just one of several issues that will affect their financial health. Changes to the US visa programme will also be a factor. On 22 June, the US government announced that it will stop issuing certain categories of foreign-worker visa — notably the H-1B visa for foreigners hired as university faculty members or by technology firms — until the end of the year. “It’s hard to say which is the major influence,” says Suzanne Ortega, president of the Council of Graduate Schools in Washington DC, which represents 500 universities worldwide, mostly in the United States and Canada. “They’re both really important and still very much in flux.”

Suzanne Ortega, president of the US Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), an association based in Washington DC that represents about 500 universities in the United States, Canada and elsewhere, calls the plan to revoke visas unworkable. Announcing the action so soon before the upcoming semester, she adds, creates an impossible timeline. Ortega believes that PhD students could have more latitude than undergraduates to meet in-person instruction requirements through independent study and laboratory work, but notes that there are still many uncertainties.

Suzanne Ortega is president of the Council of Graduate Schools, a not-for-profit group based in the United States. The council provides support to graduate school education and research projects.

Ortega told VOA that just like for everyone else, the sudden, unexpected spread of the coronavirus came as a shock to U.S. academic institutions. Luckily, many schools have been developing crisis communication and risk management plans for years. Some acted quickly, deciding not just to send students home and move classes online. They also decided which research projects to continue and which ones could be delayed.

While colleges sort through those challenges, education groups are making the case to federal officials that Optional Practical Training is an essential tool for bringing international students to U.S. campuses.

“This should not be an us versus them type of conversation,” said Lauren Inouye, vice president for public policy and government affairs at the Council of Graduate Schools.

Elite schools actually saw an increase last year in international graduate students, according to the Council of Graduate Schools.