By Jesse Coleman
As the sun rises on the 21st century, its rays first creep over the Yangtze and Ganges rivers. An awakening lion casts its shadow far across the Pacific Ocean and touches upon American shores.
The great nation of China, a country whose rich and tumultuous past forms the basis for the lives of one-fourth of the earth”s people, is rising up and coming into her own.
Many of her children are coming to America to seek a better education and learn the skills necessary to bring their country onto equal footing with the other developed nations of the world.
But, as they begin to taste the good life common to most Americans, many of these students choose not to return to their home nation. This influx of the best and the brightest of Chinese youth to American universities causes great concern on both sides of the Pacific.
Since the 1985 agreement to allow Chinese students to study in the United States, the number of Chinese students has grown to 50,000, according to Yang Jiechi, ambassador of the People”s Republic of China to the U.S.
“It has gone from a trickle to a current,” Yang said.
But as the number continues to increase, larger numbers are being rejected at the gates.
United States embassies rejected 41 percent of applications to obtain a visa from May 15 to June 20, the New York Times reported. This is an increase of 27 percent from the same time last year.
This decrease cannot be seen at surface level at BYU. This semester, 158 Chinese students make their home here, making up more than 9 percent of the international population. Last year at this time, there were 148 Chinese students.
One of the first of these students to come to United States under the Open Door Policy was Li Xian-jin,, now a professor in the mathematics department at BYU. Li had no difficulty at the time getting into the United States because there were relatively few Chinese students coming. It has only been in recent years, he said, that major difficulties have arisen.
Many students at BYU see this difficulty first-hand. Qing Xia, a Chinese student at BYU, came to the U.S. for a better education, a chance to see Christianity, and an insatiable curiosity for things new and foreign.
First going to Virginia and then to Utah, Qing converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and will be one of the few members of that church when she returns to her home country.
Qing”s first attempts to obtain a visa failed. Three years ago, she traveled from her home in a small town north of Beijing to the city Shen-Yang. The number who applied that day for a visa was between 300-400 people.
“I believe about 5 people got a visa. I was late, so they told me to come back next day. I said I better not, if you are rejected once, next time it will be harder,” Qing said.
Her next attempt was in to Shanghai, where she prepared to answer all the questions she knew the Embassy would ask her.
“Shanghai is more open. It”s a window between our side and the inside of China,” she said. With her second attempt, she obtained a visa.
Now, as Qing continues her study, she admits that most Chinese students she knows choose to stay here.
“I have to say this is a great country,” she said.
Another Chinese student had to attempt three times before obtaining a visa. Shuling Yuan, a graduate student from Beijing studying accounting said she was rejected the first two times because she couldn”t show enough evidence that she planned to return to China. She finally convinced them on the third try by citing a previous trip she had made to Houston.
“I told them if I wanted to stay in U.S., I would (have not) come back after my business trip,” Yuan said.
Chinese students are indeed finding it difficult to obtain visas to study in the U.S., said Paul Hyer, executive director of the International Society at the Kennedy Center and former mission president of the Taipei, Taiwan Mission.
Hyer, who has been traveling back and forth from China for the last 10 years said there are a number of reasons Chinese students are finding it difficult to obtain a visa.
The first reason is simply that many students who come to the U.S. choose not to go back to China.
“Talent will move to where the rewards are,” Hyer said. “The young Chinese stay in this country because the reward is greater than what they will receive in China.”
These rewards include a higher standard of living and the opportunity to have more than one child, something that is restricted in their home nation. Although China and other eastern nations are attempting to keep their future generation from all draining into the West with higher salaries and better working conditions, many students are choosing to stay stateside.
Students who study in the U.S. are often among the top in the nation, Hyer said, and this brain drain is distressing the Chinese government. Thus, the Chinese government issues fewer passports.
Also as the U.S. begins to experience economic hardships, the embassies begin to restrict immigration.
“Consulate officers tighten up when the U.S. economy is suffering,” Hyer said.
The U.S. Embassy in Beijing, which issues passports for Chinese students entering the U.S. has stated that students wishing to obtain a visa must show a clear intent to return to China after finishing their studies.
“The Embassy has evidence that in the recent past a high percentage of students did not return to China after graduation,” the Web site of the Embassy states. “Generally, applicants must show that they have legitimate, self-serving reasons to return to China after their graduation.”
Applicants wishing to enter the U.S. must also show they have the funds necessary to stay, admission into a college or university, and “social, economic, and other ties that would compel the applicant”s departure from the United States after a temporary and lawful stay.”
Despite these restrictions, Charles Bennett, chief of the visa section at the American Embassy in Beijing, has stated there is no restriction on specifically Chinese students. In a series of telephone queries last year, Bennett dispelled a number of myths concerning visa requirements, including the myth that Chinese students must follow different laws in order to get a visa than students from other nations.
“There is one U.S. law concerning student visas — a law passed by Congress — and that law applies just as much to students from France, from Russia or from Mexico as to students from China,” Bennett said.
Bennett has also stated that issuing visas has nothing to do with the current political atmosphere between the U.S. and China.
“Whether or not we issue somebody a visa depends not on politics, but rather on that individual applicant”s qualifications,” Bennett said.
The fact that Chinese students are choosing to stay in the U.S. is also a concern for BYU, Hyer said. Some departments at BYU will bring Chinese students who have positions in China to study here hoping will go back and establish contacts in China.
“They will be friends to America and friends of the church,” Hyer said.
One alternative for Chinese students coming American universities is the growing level of private education in China. Since the Chinese government can only educate 2-3 percent of its college-age population, many affluent Chinese are founding their own colleges as a way to give back to their people and grow a new generation of educated Chinese. Many are interested in this alternative solution, both in China and the U.S.
“A number of Chinese students here at BYU as well as BYU itself are very interested in this private education alternative,” Hyer said.
