photo by: University of Kansas

The skyline of the University of Kansas is pictured.

Northwest Missouri State, a university with an enrollment of about 9,000, has had 43 international students recently lose their visas that allow them to stay in the U.S, the university’s president has announced.

The recent announcement has created a natural question around the University of Kansas and its more than 30,000 students: How many KU students have lost their student visas and are being forced to leave the country?

KU officials aren’t saying, but a spokeswoman indicated such visa revocations are happening here.

“To respect student privacy, we are not sharing specific information, but the university is providing support to those affected,” KU spokeswoman Erinn Barcomb-Peterson told the Journal-World via email.

The university also declined to comment on whether the number of student visa revocations has been greater than an average year.

The Journal-World asked Barcomb-Peterson for further clarification on how releasing a total related to student visa revocations would risk identifying any individual students or potentially violate the privacy of those students. The Journal-World hasn’t received any such clarification or additional information from the university.

Student visa revocations have been the subject of a couple of high profile national cases, including that of Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil , who is mounting a legal challenge to the Trump administration’s efforts to deport him after determining his views are a threat to U.S. foreign policy.

But less publicized cases of student visa revocations are piling up, a couple of groups who track such issues report. NAFSA, one of the largest associations for international educators, estimates there have been nearly 1,000 visas of students and scholars revoked since mid-March, The Washington Post reported.

Another organization, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told The Washington Post that it believes the number of revocations for international students is closer to 4,700 since President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

At Northwest Missouri State in Maryville, Mo., President Lance Tatum said the university had confirmed 43 students affiliated with the university have had their visas revoked. Of those, 38 are “optional practical students who have graduated but remain in the U.S. for employment associated with their F1 visas,” Tatum said in a message to his campus community.

Tatum said his university’s International Involvement Center is working with students who have been impacted by the revocations.

“However, these students also are being advised that they depart the U.S. immediately to avoid accruing unlawful presence,” Tatum said in the message.

At KU, it is unclear what department is working with students or what advice they are being given about revoked visas.

Of its approximately 30,000 students, just less than 2,000 of them are international students, according to Fall 2024 enrollment statistics released by KU. Most are enrolled at KU’s Lawrence campus, with about 200 international students at the KU Medical Center campus

International enrollment on the Lawrence campus has been on a downward trend for years. The Lawrence campus’ 2024 enrollment of 1,741 students is down from 2,031 in 2019, just prior to the pandemic shutting down much international travel. KU’s 2024 total is also down from a recent high of 2,363 students in 2015, just prior to the start of Trump’s first term in office.

International enrollment at KU’s medical school has been on more of an upward trend. Its fall 2024 enrollment of 235 international students is a recent high. It is above the 197 figure of 2019 and also above the 175 international students enrolled in 2015.