Earlier this week, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced significant changes related to the Student and Exchange Visitor Program that seriously impact the experience and opportunities for international students in colleges and universities across the United States. The Hollins community stands with our international students in opposition to this policy, and supports the Association of American Universities, NASPA, and the American Council for Education in speaking out against this policy. We decry the unnecessarily difficult position in which our students, and the more than one million international students nationally, have been placed.
Our decision to reopen the campus and offer a wide array of learning modalities enables Hollins’ international students to continue their education. We are actively supporting our international students and are incredibly grateful to the numerous students, alumnae/i, and faculty who have reached out to us to express their concern for our international students. Our international programs director, Ramona Kirsch, and Jeri Suarez, our associate dean of cultural and community engagement, have been in contact with our students, and we will keep these lines of communication open as we approach the fall term.
As our mission states, “Hollins nurtures civility, integrity, and concern for others, encourages and values diversity and social justice.” In this and every moment, we must continue to live up to our own ideals.
Mary Dana Hinton
President
Hollins University