Once I heard the information that the US had expanded the journey restrictions, blocking Nigerian worldwide college students from acquiring US visas and including extra African international locations to each partial restrictions and full bans, I used to be devastated. The announcement broke at night time, and due to the time distinction, I genuinely couldn’t sleep. It was deeply disheartening.
My crew and I’ve spent years doing the laborious, usually invisible work of serving to African college students break by means of systemic boundaries to world alternatives. Schooling is among the strongest instruments for entry; it opens doorways, builds networks, and permits gifted younger folks to completely realise their potential. So to look at insurance policies repeatedly roll again that entry, particularly for Africans, is exhausting and heartbreaking.
This yr alone, this isn’t the primary coverage to disproportionately have an effect on Africans, and that cumulative weight issues. We struggle each day to create entry, but it feels just like the world retains discovering new methods to shut doorways.
What has made this particularly painful is the human impression. We’re at the moment supporting two distinctive younger males from South Sudan, refugees with extraordinary potential who we genuinely consider may entry a totally funded schooling within the US. Now, with South Sudan included on the complete ban listing, I don’t even know learn how to start navigating that dialog with them.
On the identical time, we’ve simply concluded a really intense MBA spherical one cycle. Lots of our shoppers, Nigerians on the continent and within the diaspora, have secured affords from a number of the high 1% of faculties on this planet. We’re speaking about admissions to Harvard, Columbia, and Duke, with scholarships. These college students did every thing proper. They ready for years, sat for the GRE or GMAT, constructed robust profiles, and earned these affords on benefit.
And now the query they’re asking us is: what does this imply for me?
In case you maintain solely a Nigerian passport, you at the moment don’t even have the choice to attempt for a US pupil visa. Beforehand, the problem was navigating lengthy wait instances and backlogs. Now, there is no such thing as a pathway in any respect. No interview. No appointment. No likelihood. That degree of uncertainty is extremely destabilising for college students and for the establishments that admitted them.
Beforehand, the problem was navigating lengthy wait instances and backlogs. Now, there is no such thing as a pathway in any respect.
As advisors, we’re having troublesome, emotional calls each day. College students are confused, harm, and scared. And whereas we perceive the coverage language, the true query is how it will play out in apply, particularly when universities themselves are working underneath concern and strain. We’ve already seen worldwide admissions tightening on account of broader political forces, the rollback of DEI scholarships, and elevated scrutiny of universities. This newest transfer compounds an already fragile system.
Proper now, our precedence is care and readability. We’re advising college students to not panic, however to be strategic. That features recommending that they pause on paying US college deposits, lodging charges, or making irreversible monetary commitments till there’s extra readability. We’re additionally encouraging college students to think about different pathways, notably in Europe and Canada, even when their hearts are set on the US. That’s not a simple dialog, however it’s a essential one.
This second has compelled us to rethink timelines, rework utility methods, and prolong our assist far past what we anticipated on the finish of the yr. It’s worrying. It’s emotionally draining. And it’s deeply unfair to college students who’ve already confirmed they belong.
Nonetheless, we stay dedicated. We’re displaying up for our college students, speaking consistently, and doing every thing we will to assist them navigate this uncertainty with dignity and hope. Schooling ought to be a bridge, not a battleground. And we are going to proceed to advocate for entry, fairness, and alternative, even when the doorways really feel heavier to push open.
