I am all in favor of helping people. But we face a clear and present STEM shortage, I linked a BLS page above. We aren't going to start producing internal STEM graduates tomorrow even if you figure out the perfect educational system today. I am highly skeptical any system will get a high school senior to go from major underperformer to STEM superstar this year. Maybe I am wrong but I don't think so.
I was at a computer security conference 15 years ago, the guy was talking about how much work the US government is doing in computers. He worked for one of the biggest groups in computer security. He said the government had a long history of going out and tracking down the best graduating mathematicians in the world and bringing them into the NSA. Now they tended to focus more on attack than defense, but they were there. The point is that we depend on our technology in defense. We depend on it in our economics. We depend on it in our medicine. There are no miracle fixes to produce American STEM students in mass quantities next year.
According to Congressional Research Service (
https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11347#:~:text=Source: CRS display of data,22% in SY2016- 2017.) :
Foreign STEM students also make up an increasing share of total students receiving STEM degrees at U.S. IHEs, doubling from 11% in SY1988-1989 to 22% in SY2016- 2017. This percentage is even higher for graduate degrees, as foreign students accounted for 54% of master’s degrees and 44% of doctorate degrees issued in STEM fields in the United States in SY2016-2017
...
According to the National Science Foundation’s 2017 survey of STEM doctorate recipients from U.S. IHEs, 72% of foreign doctorate recipients were still in the United States 10 years after receiving their degrees. This percentage varied by country of origin; for example, STEM graduates from China (90%) and India (83%) stayed at higher rates than European students (69%).
Tomorrow we throw all international students out, we throw out all foreign STEM employees. Are we going to function as a strong economy? Are there enough Americans ready, willing, able, to step in?
Even if you developed the perfect high school today and this year's high school seniors devoted their lives to STEM, they are 6-10 years from having advanced degrees. And they might be going to universities which rely heavily on current foreign students/faculty as instructors. If they aren't here, that creates a problem in teaching.
There might be a long term solution to Americans and STEM. I'm all for finding it. But the plan to kick foreign students out of the US this year, the thread topic, ain't helping a single American interested in STEM. I feel VERY confident that US universities desperately want minority students enrolled in their STEM programs. I would bet if you spoke to the chairs at departments at universities around the country, they would say that is a top goal.
But I seriously doubt we turn that ship around with this year's senior class. I doubt it is true even for Jr or SO, or FR. Why am I wrong with that, do you think we can fill those 22% of undergrads in a year?