US universities are recruiting Indian and Nigerian students to replace Chinese. It's not working.

Bullets:

Chinese university students contribute over $14 billion a year to the US economy.

But Chinese families are increasingly choosing to either study in China, or to other countries.

This shift is deepening the fiscal crises in American higher education, which also suffers from a steep decline in US student populations.

US universities are heavily recruiting students from India and Africa, in the hope to make up for shortfalls in Chinese enrollments.

Briefly, this strategy seemed to work. A surge in students from India pushed China into second place, as a leading country of origin for US international students.

But that was short-lived. Indian enrollment in the past year plunged, with 99,000 fewer students. Nigeria also saw double-digit percentage declines in just a one-year period.

A more serious problem, however, exists in the financial commitments of the students’ families. Chinese students cluster in the most highly-ranked, and most expensive, US university programs. In comparison, Indian and especially Nigerian students tend to attend far lower-cost programs.

Report:

Good morning.

American universities and colleges are in fiscal crisis, and many universities now are closing campuses and shutting down departments. There are too few American students to go around. But for our top universities they had, until recently, managed to make a lot of money from International students, especially on students from China. Now that cash cow is going away too. Chinese student enrollment is falling sharply in US schools, for lots of reasons.

This is from the Los Angeles Times, and a China-based expert is advising US universities that the enrollment numbers they’re seeing from China now are likely the highest they will ever see again.

All the reasons for that are summed up, right here, in a perfect one-paragraph summary of the discussions happening today in hundreds of thousands of households across China. It’s a conversation with a Chinese parent who had already sent one child over to study in the US, and is unsure about what to do for child #2. She’s wondering if an American degree is worth it anymore. The cost of a US degree is immense, compared to universities here. It’s harder to get a job in the US after graduation, and companies here in China prefer to hire graduates of Chinese universities instead of foreign schools. Previously, studying abroad was considered prestigious, now it’s reversed. Undergraduate education in the US is no longer appealing, and that is now the popular opinion.

For American universities and college towns, this is hitting their finances hard. Chinese students usually pay full tuition, full room and board, and dump a lot of money into local economies where the students are going to school.

The United States runs a large services sector surplus with China, which runs over $32 billion per year. Here are total exports of services from the US to China, at over $46 billion in 2023. About a third of that was education-related travel and services, which include tuition, books, and living expenses.

So this is all a big hit to our national economy, as well as to the finances of schools, if more and more Chinese families decide to keep their kids here, or send them somewhere else. So in order to survive, US universities are desperately seeking students from other countries to replace the ones they are losing from China. They’re spending more to recruit students from India and Nigeria, for example. And that strategy seemed to be working, as universities saw a big spike in students from India, which became the largest country of origin for students, passing China

But now the numbers have flipped back. International enrollments have collapsed, year over year. This was locked in, even before the news about deep cuts to research funding and travel and visa restrictions. This analysis is “not about what might happen, it’s what has already happened.” The trend that began under the Biden Administration through March 2025 do not yet reflect the recent policy changes from the Trump presidency, and still US universities saw a drop of 130,000 international students. The author implies here that these huge drops we saw under Biden are not likely to see a big bounce the other way, so American universities can expect even worse times ahead. That drop of 130,000 students represents a decline of 11% from March of last year to March 2025. It is “remarkable” both in how big the change is, and how fast it happened. The potential revenue loss is up to $4 billion.

And here we run into the replacement problem. Remember that US universities are trying to find Indian and Nigerian students to replace the Chinese kids who aren’t coming anymore. But there was a 27.9% drop in Indian students, along with a slight increase of kids from China. Now China is again the top country of origin, but it’s addition by subtraction, in this case. India is off a cliff, with about 99,000 fewer Indians coming over. Nigeria is the top sending African country, and they were the second biggest percentage decline, off 16% since last year.

Here is another major challenge for universities, who are trying to recruit students from India or Africa to replace Chinese. The money isn’t the same. Chinese families pay a lot more for US educations compared to families elsewhere.

These charts tell that story. This is for undergraduate study, per year, prices paid by students from India, China, and Nigeria. Chinese students are clustered in university programs costing $38 thousand per year, up to 62 thousand a year. In the case of India, shift everything down by over $20,000. Those students cluster in programs costing $10,000 per year, up to $40,000. Two takeaways here, then. Indian students are attending lower cost programs, and their average upper limit is the same as Chinese lower tier spending. US schools, then, industrywide, need two Indian students to replace a single Chinese.

The numbers for Nigerian students are even worse. The US university system needs to find three Nigerians for every Chinese student who stays home. And looking at these tables another way, we can make some guesses about the composition of university classes: In a school with a lot of Nigerian and Indian students, you won’t find many Chinese studying there. In departments with high numbers of Chinese students, there will fewer students from India, and very few from Nigeria.

And comments like this are common, in the discussion sections of these news articles. Chinese kids can be easily replaced, the thinking goes. Just look at the chart, which shows India taking the lead as the top source country for US international students. That shows how many kids from India are coming over. But that is old news, and now the Indian students aren’t coming either.

And it was always misleading, anyway. There were never enough Indians go to around either, especially if they pay just half what Chinese families do.

Resources and links:

Why Chinese students still want to attend U.S. universities

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2025-02-21/why-chinese-students-still-want-to-attend-u-s-universities

Interest in studying in US dropped 42% in January

https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20250318151109452

There are already 130,000 fewer international students in the US. Has anyone noticed?

There are already 130,000 fewer international students in the US. Has anyone noticed?

Already facing Trump administration cuts, US colleges risk losses from another revenue source: foreign students

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/18/us/international-students-universities-funding-trump/index.html

SEVIS Data Shows Declining Number of International Students in the United States

https://www.aau.edu/newsroom/leading-research-universities-report/sevis-data-shows-declining-number-international

Wall Street Journal, Chinese Students on U.S. Campuses Are Ensnared in Political Standoff

https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/china-us-student-visas-travel-advisories-6f194b3e

Tracking College Closures and Mergers

https://www.bestcolleges.com/research/closed-colleges-list-statistics-major-closures/

The Demographic Cliff: What It Means for College Admissions and Higher Education

https://www.applerouth.com/blog/the-demographic-cliff-what-it-means-for-college-admissions-and-higher-education

US: New survey shows international student recruitment shifting to India in 2023

https://monitor.icef.com/2023/07/us-new-survey-shows-international-student-recruitment-shifting-to-india-in-2023/

Why the Next Wave of International Students May Come From Africa

https://www.bestcolleges.com/news/wave-of-international-students-comes-from-africa/