Giving Compass' Take:

· Writing for Education Dive, Natalie Schwartz reports that a federal judge has struck down the Trump administration's policy which would have made it easier to impose reentry bans on international students. 

· What is "unlawful presence" and how is it calculated?  Why would such a policy be implemented?  

· Read more about this topic and colleges that pushed against a visa policy change that would impact students. 

In 2018, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said that it was changing how it calculated "unlawful presence" for international students who were staying in the U.S. through the country's visa program.

Under the initial policy, when international students are notified that they have incurred a status violation — such as failing to update their address or enrolling below their minimum course load — they begin accumulating "unlawful presence days." Once they accrue 180 days, they can be barred from the country for three years.

But the Trump administration attempted to backdate unlawful presence to the moment of a status violation, meaning a student could be moving closer to a reentry ban every day without realizing it.

Biggs wrote in her order that under the Trump administration's policy, "unlawful presence accrues sooner and more frequently." She added that it was "a significant change from past practice" and ran "afoul of the (Immigration and Nationality Act's) plain text."

Guilford College, in North Carolina, and several other colleges sued the Trump administration over the policy in 2018. Biggs placed a nationwide preliminary injunction on the policy in 2019.

Leaders of the colleges said the latest decision brought relief to their campuses.

"Even though the policy was halted in May, campuses were already feeling the negative effects, with rising anxiety among international students and concerns that future students would be discouraged from coming to study on our campuses," Jane Fernandes, president of Guilford College, said in a statement.

Read the full article about reentry bans on international students by Natalie Schwartz at Education Dive.