Over 2,300 ISU students may face new challenges in the upcoming school year.

Under a new homeland security directive issued by President Bush, international students studying in the United States will be monitored more closely than before, and may be limited in the majors they are allowed to study.

According to a White House news release, “The Government shall implement measures to end the abuse of student visas and prohibit certain international students from receiving education and training in sensitive areas, including areas of study with direct application to the development and use of weapons of mass destruction. The government shall also prohibit the education and training of foreign nationals who would use such training to harm the United States or its Allies.”

The directive is part of President Bush’s plan to ensure homeland security. Under the plan, students may be subject to stricter visa laws and tracking. An international student could be monitored in regards to his or her major, current status, particular classes and educational funding.

The program would unite the Attorney General, the Secretaries of State, Education, Energy and Defense, the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and any other applicable entities on a team to determine “questionable areas of study,” the White House news release said.

According to the release, the program would enable the United States to, if necessary, “identify problematic applicants for student visas and deny their applications.”

Iowa State offers several majors and programs of study that could fall under the directive. Majors that might be banned for certain students could include biotechnology, aerospace or, nuclear engineering, radiation technology and some computer applications.

“We have some areas of study at ISU that are fairly sensitive,” said Steffen Schmidt, university professor of political science.

Schmidt said the United States has entered a kind of “quasi-war.”

“Certain nationalities have been perpetrators of American deaths,” he said. “Bush is having to play with the question: `If someone from South America comes to the U.S. to study some field of microbiology, nuclear energy, power, fission, computer, are we taking a chance we’re training someone who’ll turn that on us and cause harm to Americans with the knowledge we gave them?’ “

Schmidt said universities must decide what to do with their knowledge and whom to teach.

Student restrictions have a historical precedent. During World War II, German students, unless they were anti-Nazi, were prohibited from studying in the United States, Schmidt said.

Another reason for the directive, beyond student monitoring, may be to punish non-compliant governments, or at least force them to examine their policies more closely, he said.

“If we can get governments to crack down on people like that, then hopefully this policy can be a short policy that doesn’t last for many years – that would be my biggest hope,” Schmidt said. “I think there’s a lot of symbolism in that policy – not necessarily that Bush wants to keep out foreign students, but we want to force the hand of the governments.”

“There are a bunch of things dealing with students from terrorist nations – there are hardly any students from those countries here at ISU, so it’s no big deal,” said Dennis Peterson, director of International Student Services. “We’ve got other things to worry about.”

Peterson said the directive is still uncertain and might be modified greatly before it is implemented.

“There’s still a lot of turns in the road before we know what we’ll be facing,” he said.

The monitoring program is supposed to be set in place by January 2003.

Yasir Khan, senior in electrical engineering, said he understands the government’s reasoning behind the new regulations, but fears profiling international students may lead to increased paranoia among American citizens.

“The U.S. government believes it has to take steps to increase security,” said Khan, who is from Pakistan. “However, since Sept. 11, sometimes [Pakistanis] feel like [they’re] profiled for no reason.”

Fahad Wajid, junior in electrical engineering, agreed with Khan.

“[The government] should do this for security purposes – security should be a prime concern,” said Wajid, who is also from Pakistan. “But these rules could have a negative effect on students.”