Chinese home in on rosier opportunities

For increasing numbers of Chinese, the choice to return home after studying in the United States is becoming ever more attractive with welcoming policies that make use of their talents as bureaucratic barriers in the US help sway the decision.

Cultural attachment to China is also a major factor in the decisionmaking of Chinese finishing their studies. Throw in the toughened conditions for getting a work visa and a rising anti-Chinese sentiment in the US and the homeward pull becomes even stronger.

Around 580,300 students returned to China in 2019 from countries around the world, an increase from 135,000 in 2010, the Ministry of Education said. The number increased to 777,000 in 2020 and passed 1 million in 2021.

It said that 2.01 million Chinese students studying abroad between 2016 and 2019 had returned after graduation. The figure amounted to 80 percent of all Chinese who had studied overseas during the period.

For Chinese studying in the US, the first hurdle for those wanting to stay after graduation is to obtain an H-1B visa, the nonimmigrant visa that allows US companies to employ foreign workers in specialty occupations that require theoretical or technical expertise, said Lihua Tan, a partner and immigration attorney at law firm Chugh in Santa Clara, California.

Over the years, Tan and her colleagues have helped corporate and individual applicants in Silicon Valley to file immigration documents. Big US technology companies, such as Apple, Google, Amazon and Microsoft, typically seek top graduates that major in subjects covering science, technology, engineering and mathematics, and they sponsor these graduates’ visa applications.

However, that common procedure has become increasingly difficult in recent years with the suspicions among many in the US Congress on the intentions of foreign students, especially those from China.

Former US president Donald Trump was instrumental in these efforts during his presidency, as sentiment was whipped up against Chinese-born students and scholars.

In 2021, Republican lawmaker Mo Brooks proposed the American Jobs First Act, with the intention of overhauling the H-1B visa program by imposing additional requirements for applicants and their sponsors.

In 2018, Chinese graduates represented 12 percent of the 332,000 H-1B petitions approved by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to a report compiled by data-tracking company Statista.

The abrupt revision in immigration policy in the US led to chaos and has hurt many Chinese graduates, said Tan.

“I would say the increased difficulty to acquire an immigration visa has directly impacted their lives,” said Tan.

“They should have been able to apply what they’ve learned from US universities and labs to jobs offered in the US.”

As barriers rose in the US, the Chinese government increased the incentives for graduates from foreign universities to return.

In June, Shanghai announced that it would relax its household registration-permit regulation by granting the hukou, a residency permit, to nonlocal students who graduate from the world’s top 50 universities if they work in the city starting from July.

Attractive policies

Several other big cities in China have also adopted similar policies.

“A strong message of (welcoming talent) was sent,” said Emily Chang, a business management major at the University of Pennsylvania. Unlike past generations who cling to the concept of the “American Dream”, many of the new generation students prefer opportunities at home.

Shenzhen welcomed 27,000 returning Chinese students in 2021, an increase of more than 30 percent year-on-year and a record high, according to Shenzhen’s municipal human resources and social security bureau.

There are also those who decided to return simply because they believe in “family first”.

Kevin Chen, who studied digital media at NYU Tandon School of Engineering, is one of them.

He participated in the Go Local Program at NYU Shanghai when the pandemic hit in 2020 and enjoyed being close to family for one and a half years in Shanghai.

He secured an internship in New York this summer after attending in-person classes last fall. However, he applied to intern online so that he could return to Shanghai to be with his family.

“I don’t complain about shuffling back and forth between New York and Shanghai because family is my top priority,” he said.