Two international universities in China have told their overseas students to prepare for a return to campus as early as March, after they were shut out of the country because of the pandemic.
While there has been no official announcement on when China’s borders will reopen to foreign students, Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou and New York University Shanghai have both sent out emails saying they could be allowed back on campus in time for the next semester.
China’s borders have been closed to most foreigners since March 2020, with special exemptions granted for work or family reasons. That has left many of the country’s half a million international students stranded overseas and unable to attend classes in person.
“The DKU leadership understands that China is now working on a detailed plan to facilitate international students’ safe entry to the Chinese mainland. Early indications suggest that this procedure, once finalised, will allow students to enter gradually in groups over time to ensure suitable and sufficient quarantine measures,” according to the email, which was posted on Twitter on Monday by a reporter with Duke University’s student newspaper, The Chronicle.
There was no date for when students might be able to start applying for visas or when they might be able to enter China, but the email said the progress was “encouraging”.
International students received a similar email from NYU Shanghai on Monday, saying it was confident they would be able to attend campus next semester. Sent by David Pe, the dean of students, it said they should work with their academic advisers in the coming month to register for classes in Shanghai, get vaccinated, and begin looking at direct flights. The email, which was also posted on Twitter, said students would have to complete a 21-day quarantine period before the end of January.
An overseas student officer with NYU Shanghai confirmed the advice for students to prepare to return, but said there was no date yet for that to happen.
“Students will be required to undergo a 14+7 quarantine, with the first two weeks to be carried out at government-designated venues and the last week of self-quarantine at other venues. Students are expected to bear the costs themselves,” said the student officer, who declined to be named.