UMass issued the following announcement today:
The University of Massachusetts Amherst today announced that it will accept Iranian students into science and engineering programs, developing individualized study plans to meet the requirements of federal sanctions law and address the impact on students. The decision to revise the university’s approach follows consultation with the State Department and outside counsel.
“This approach reflects the university’s longstanding commitment to wide access to educational opportunities,” said Michael Malone, vice chancellor for research and engagement. “We have always believed that excluding students from admission conflicts with our institutional values and principles. It is now clear, after further consultation and deliberation, that we can adopt a less restrictive policy.”
Federal law, the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights Act of 2012, requires that the U.S. Department of State deny visas to Iranian students wishing to engage in certain fields of study related to the energy sector, nuclear science, nuclear engineering or a related field at U.S. colleges and universities. To comply with the law and its impacts, UMass Amherst will develop individualized study plans as appropriate based on a student’s projected coursework and research in conjunction with an offer of admission. The plan will be updated as required during a student’s course of study.
NBC News has more on the story.
Thanks to everyone who wrote to the university to express their opposition to the university’s policy of prohibiting Iranian nationals from applying to select departments in engineering and the natural sciences. This was a story, I’m proud to say, that got broken here and at my blog (thanks to a tip from a professor in Colorado), and which rapidly got picked up in the national  media. Well done, everyone!
{ 15 comments }
David J. Littleboy 02.18.15 at 8:14 pm
Well done, Corey!!!
William Berry 02.18.15 at 8:21 pm
Simply awesome.
Abbe Faria 02.18.15 at 9:49 pm
This is brilliant. It’s great news that those Iranian women who can get their husband’s consent to obtain a passport and travel abroad will now be able to use these programs.
tony lynch 02.18.15 at 10:26 pm
I wish I was as funny as you, Abbe.
Abbe Faria 02.18.15 at 10:45 pm
It’s not a joke. We’ve gone from US state department influenced admissions to an Iranian government influenced admissions. People just get upset about one actor and form of discrimination, while the other’s in line with universities longstanding commitment to
wide access to educational opportunitiestake tuition money and accept male students from regimes who practice systematic gender discrimination without making a fuss. Just pointing out facts.The Temporary Name 02.18.15 at 10:53 pm
No, there’s still SEVIS and there’s still the Iranian government. It’s just that UMass is being less stupid about it.
Fuzzy Dunlop 02.18.15 at 11:22 pm
That’s excellent news! Thank you for your role in helping publicize this.
jonnybutter 02.20.15 at 1:55 am
People just get upset about one actor and form of discrimination, ….
What do you propose, Abbe?
Abbe Faria 02.20.15 at 8:31 pm
* refuse tuition fees or other funding from repressive regimes.
* don’t accept degrees from institutions which practice segregation or gender based course bans as fulfilling academic prerequisites.
* cut links with institutions in gender repressive regimes
And then you can get more creative.
* require male Iranians to obtain a letter of permission from their wives before embarking on or graduating from a course
* overbill gender repressive regime nationals to fund female only international scholarships.
Really, anything except taking the $ and keeping quiet.
jonnybutter 02.20.15 at 10:27 pm
refuse tuition fees or other funding from repressive regimes.
Obviously we would need to check with you to see which regimes are repressive and which aren’t.
The Temporary Name 02.20.15 at 11:11 pm
Not everyone in Iran is a Shia muslim, and not every official is going to understand that.
UserGoogol 02.22.15 at 5:58 am
Abbe Faria: It seems counterproductive to respond to people being prevented from going to American colleges by allowing even less people to go to American colleges.
Meredith 02.22.15 at 6:08 am
thank you, Abbe. The route to avoiding all this so as to study at UMass is, female or male: Canada? (Some Nordic countries can work, too.)
As a classicist I hate to use the term this way, but yet: Byzantine, anyone? Byzantium’s revenge?
But on my mind even more. So you end up in Amherst, MA (familiar enough to me, though I am from another part of the state). Through the ENDLESS snow and cold you make it to the classes you’re allowed to take: weird, so weird — really, all classes aren’t open to anyone with the prerequisites?). Which are these classes? Who gets to decide?
Let’s abolish the very idea of “the university”! I don’t see any of this as a victory unless UMass is playing political games of supreme sophistication. I can hope (I was earlier hopeful), but with Charlie Baker our new governor, I dunno. Maybe a battle victory, but who can say without knowing what the war is?
iyan riana 02.22.15 at 7:30 am
Finally.. this is a good news for All of us
The Temporary Name 02.24.15 at 8:03 pm
The link below comes from an institute concerned with the Middle East that seems to have the standard awful people on its board of advisors, but is nonetheless full of useful information about what an Iranian student has to go through to get to the US, and worth a look if you’re interested in such things, politically or otherwise.
A third of the students are women, a lot of those are in fields that, in the US, are very male.
http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/uploads/Documents/pubs/PolicyFocus_133_Ditto3.pdf
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