The federal government is now approaching the three-month mark since the database for tracking international students in the United States was supposed to be completed, and according to a new report released by the U.S. Department of Justice, the database is still far from being fully operational.
In 2001, the USA Patriot Act was passed, which required the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service to establish a database of sorts to track all foreign students studying in the United States.
“Historically, the INS devoted insufficient attention to foreign students attending United States schools, and its paper-based tracking system was inefficient, inaccurate and unreliable,” said the report issued this month.
The INS worked to construct the database, which, when completed Jan. 1, was titled the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System. The INS then transferred the system over to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security March 1.
“The INS has made progress in implementing SEVIS, and we believe that SEVIS should provide a useful tool to help the INS monitor both foreign students and the schools that they attend,” said the report.
However, the report also states that there are still serious concerns with the INS’s implementation of SEVIS.
“The INS has not dedicated adequate resources to the program to ensure that SEVIS applications are adjudicated promptly …” the report reads.
In addition, the report states that there are serious problems regarding INS inadequately training and supervising the contractors the government uses to ensure that colleges are genuine institutions of higher education.
Despite the areas the report criticizes regarding the SEVIS system, several areas are noted where progress has been made. These areas include requiring previously approved institutions to reapply.
In addition, the report notes that the INS did indeed lack the money and personnel to investigate fraud and enforce the new laws. The National Security Entry-Exit Registration System, an additional database required by the government that is used to register men from many predominantly Arab and Muslim countries, also took up much of the time of INS employees. This ultimately gave them less time to invest in the SEVIS system.
Because these acknowledgments still do not come as an excuse for the lack of progress in the system, several recommendations have been made in hopes of improving in the near future.
A few of these suggestions include appointing a foreign-student program manager to coordinate, and be accountable for, immigration issues affecting foreign students, as well as assigning full-time staff with the sole responsibility of certifying and monitoring schools.
Monitoring contract investigators, improving checklists used by these investigators, ensuring that possible fraud is referred for investigation and ensuring that sufficient resources are available to investigate possible instances of fraud are a number of other recommendations.
“We believe these actions should be taken and are critical to ensuring that SEVIS is fully implemented, reliable and effective,” said the report.
