As more and more schools and businesses around the country get the OK to reopen, some college towns are moving in the opposite direction because of too much partying and too many COVID-19 infections among students.

With more than 300 students at the University of Missouri testing positive for the coronavirus, the local health director Friday ordered bars to stop serving alcohol at 9 p.m. and close by 10 p.m. Iowa's governor ordered all bars closed this week around the University of Iowa and Iowa State University, while the mayor of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, did the same in the hometown of the state's flagship university.

"What we're seeing in our violations is they're coming late at night," said Stephanie Browning, head of the health department for Columbia, Missouri. "Big groups gathering. They're not wearing their masks, they're not social distancing."

In Provo, Utah, the home of Brigham Young University, the Municipal Council passed a mask ordinance over the mayor's veto because of the influx of students from around the country for the start of classes Monday.

The outbreaks since students began returning to campus in the past few weeks have heightened town-gown tensions and led to recriminations between local politicians and university officials.

Meanwhile, California prepared to announce plans Friday for reopening many businesses that were shuttered in July as coronavirus cases soared. In Arizona, another deadly hot spot this summer, a drop in transmission numbers allowed the Phoenix and Tucson areas to reopen gyms and some bars on Thursday. And Ohio let theater groups this week resume performances with strict audience caps.

U.S. numbers

The U.S. has recorded over 180,000 deaths from the coronavirus and 5.9 million confirmed infections. Worldwide, the death toll is put at more than 830,000, with at least 24.5 million cases.

Surging infection numbers around the U.S. have been blamed in part on young people ignoring mask and social distancing requirements.

Browning, who also slapped a 20-person limit on crowds, said the percentage of tests coming back positive for the virus in the county hit 44% last week, four times higher than before students returned to classes. Chancellor Mun Choi said the university is not considering going to online-only classes.

In Iowa's Story County, where Iowa State is located, 74% of new cases over the past seven days were among people ages 19 to 24, Gov. Kim Reynolds said Thursday. In the same time period, 69% of new cases in Johnson County, the home of the University of Iowa, were in that age group.

"It is increasing the virus activity in the community, and it's spilling over to other segments of the population," Reynolds said.

The University of Alabama has recorded over 500 cases of COVID-19 on campus since the fall semester began last week. In closing the town's bars Monday for the next two weeks, Mayor Walt Maddox said that an unchecked spread of the virus threatens both the health care system and the local economy if students have to be sent home for the semester for remote learning.

North Carolina classes

Three of North Carolina's largest public universities have abruptly halted in-person undergraduate instruction and directed students to move out of the dorms after hundreds tested positive following their return to campus. Nearly 800 have been confirmed infected at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, more than 670 at North Carolina State and around 300 at East Carolina University.

Leaders at UNC-Chapel Hill, which has shifted to online classes, wrote an open letter Thursday to the mayor outlining steps the university is taking to curb off-campus parties, including disciplinary measures and combined patrols between campus and town police.

"We recognize the very real problems with the behaviors of some of our fraternities and sororities," the university's chancellor and provost assured the mayor.

Chapel Hill's mayor and members of the Town Council had written to the school last week urging it to expand virus testing, update its infection figures more often and spell out what discipline students would face for violating school rules and local ordinances. The local leaders decried the "vacuum left by the university's decision to take minimal responsibility for students when they are off campus."

Oyeronke Popoola, a 17-year-old freshman at UNC-Chapel Hill who moved out of her dorm, said that administrators, not students, deserve most of the blame for the virus-related problems after they ushered students back to campus.

"They should've put everything online from the beginning, but they wanted the money," she said. And she said fraternities and sororities weren't the only ones at fault among the students: "I feel like Greek life gets a lot of blame, which is understandable, but there are other students who were meeting without masks that were not a part of Greek life."

It’s tough to gain admission to Yale University, and it’s getting even tougher for international students as standout students from around the world set their sights on Yale.

The Yale Dale News, the campus newspaper, takes a look at the situation here.

Read the full story here.

Ruth Chane, a computer science major from Ethiopia, writes about her experiences settling into student life at Whitman College in the U.S. state of Washington.

"The community at Whitman College made sure I felt welcomed even before I stepped foot on campus," she says.

Read her essay here.

In The Student Life, the student newspaper for the Claremont Colleges, a consortium of five liberal art colleges and two graduate schools in Claremont, California, student Rochelle Lu writes about readjusting to her Shanghai home after spending a semester in the United States.

Read the full story here.

Cedarville University in the U.S. state of Ohio says it’s got more than 140 international students representing 44 countries.

Here, the school interviews Jonathan Sutton, director of international student services. He talks about his job and the opportunities for international students on campus.

Read the full article here.

Morehouse College, a private, historically Black liberal arts college in the U.S. state of Georgia, offers a guide for international students interested in attending the school.

Among the tips to apply and thrive at Morehouse:

• Take advantage of the school’s orientation program
• Turn to the school’s Center for Academic Success for tutoring, support and more
• Immerse yourself in campus life via clubs and societies

Read the full article here.

The administration of President Donald Trump said on Monday it will review Columbia University's federal contracts and grants over allegations of antisemitism, which it says the educational institution has shown inaction in tackling.

Rights advocates note rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias since U.S. ally Israel's devastating military assault on Gaza began after Palestinian Hamas militants' deadly October 2023 attack.

The Justice Department said a month ago it formed a task force to fight antisemitism. The U.S. Departments of Health and Education and the General Services Administration jointly made the review announcement on Monday.

"The Federal Government's Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is considering Stop Work Orders for $51.4 million in contracts between Columbia University and the Federal Government," the joint statement said.

The agencies said no contracting actions had been taken yet.

"The task force will also conduct a comprehensive review of the more than $5 billion in federal grant commitments to Columbia University."

The agencies did not respond to requests for comment on whether there were similar reviews over allegations of Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias.

Columbia had no immediate comment. It previously said it made efforts to tackle antisemitism.

College protests

Trump has signed an executive order to combat antisemitism and pledged to deport non-citizen college students and others who took part in pro-Palestinian protests.

Columbia was at the center of college protests in which demonstrators demanded an end to U.S. support for Israel due to the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel's assault on Gaza. There were allegations of antisemitism and Islamophobia in protests and counter-protests.

During last summer's demonstrations around the country, classes were canceled, some university administrators resigned and student protesters were suspended and arrested.

While the intensity of protests has decreased in recent months, there were some demonstrations last week in New York after the expulsion of two students at Columbia University-affiliated Barnard College and after New York Governor Kathy Hochul ordered the removal of a Palestinian studies job listing at Hunter College.

A third student at Barnard College has since been expelled, this one related to the occupation of the Hamilton Hall building at Columbia last year.

The Trump administration is opening new investigations into allegations of antisemitism at five U.S. universities including Columbia and the University of California, Berkeley, the Education Department announced Monday.

It's part of President Donald Trump's promise to take a tougher stance against campus antisemitism and deal out harsher penalties than the Biden administration, which settled a flurry of cases with universities in its final weeks. It comes the same day the Justice Department announced a new task force to root out antisemitism on college campuses.

In an order signed last week, Trump called for aggressive action to fight anti-Jewish bias on campuses, including the deportation of foreign students who have participated in pro-Palestinian protests.

Along with Columbia and Berkeley, the department is now investigating the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University and Portland State University. The cases were opened using the department's power to launch its own civil rights reviews, unlike the majority of investigations, which stem from complaints.

Messages seeking comment were left with all five universities.
A statement from the Education Department criticized colleges for tolerating antisemitism after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel and a wave of pro-Palestinian protests that followed. It also criticized the Biden administration for negotiating "toothless" resolutions that failed to hold schools accountable.

"Today, the Department is putting universities, colleges, and K-12 schools on notice: this administration will not tolerate continued institutional indifference to the wellbeing of Jewish students on American campuses," said Craig Trainor, the agency's acting assistant secretary for civil rights.

The department didn't provide details about the inquiries or how it decided which schools are being targeted. Presidents of Columbia and Northwestern were among those called to testify on Capitol Hill last year as Republicans sought accountability for allegations of antisemitism. The hearings contributed to the resignation of multiple university presidents, including Columbia's Minouche Shafik.

An October report from House Republicans accused Columbia of failing to punish pro-Palestinian students who took over a campus building, and it called Northwestern's negotiations with student protesters a "stunning capitulation."

House Republicans applauded the new investigations. Representative Tim Walberg, chair of the Education and Workforce Committee, said he was "glad that we finally have an administration who is taking action to protect Jewish students."

Trump's order also calls for a full review of antisemitism complaints filed with the Education Department since Oct. 7, 2023, including pending and resolved cases from the Biden administration. It encourages the Justice Department to take action to enforce civil rights laws.

Last week's order drew backlash from civil rights groups who said it violated First Amendment rights that protect political speech.

The new task force announced Monday includes the Justice and Education departments along with Health and Human Services.

"The Department takes seriously our responsibility to eradicate this hatred wherever it is found," said Leo Terrell, assistant attorney general for civil rights. "The Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is the first step in giving life to President Trump's renewed commitment to ending anti-Semitism in our schools."

The Times of India breaks down the most popular subjects for international students to study in the U.S.

STEM and business lead the pack. Read the full story here. (January 2025)

U.S. News & World report addresses some of the misconceptions about U.S. colleges and universities, including the difficulty of getting a visa.

Read the full story here. (January 2025)

US News & World Report details the three top factors in foreign students' decision to study in the U.S. They include research opportunities and the reputation of U.S. degrees. Read the full story here. (December 2024)

A British student who did a year abroad at Bowling Green State University in Ohio talks about adjusting to life in America in a TikTok video, Newsweek magazine reports.

Among the biggest surprises? Portion sizes, jaywalking laws and dorm room beds.

Read the full story here. (December 2024)

Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health reaches out to international students by detailing the international student experience at the school.

Learn more about housing, life in Boston and more here.

China issued its first national action plan to build a "strong education nation" by 2035, which it said would help coordinate its education development, improve efficiencies in innovation and build a "strong country."

The plan, issued Sunday by the Communist Party's central committee and the State Council, aims to establish a "high quality education system" with accessibility and quality "among the best in the world."

The announcement was made after data on Friday showed China's population fell for a third consecutive year in 2024, with the number of deaths outpacing a slight increase in births, and experts cautioning that the downturn will worsen in the coming years.

High childcare and education costs have been a key factor for many young Chinese opting out of having children, at a time when many face uncertainty over their job prospects amid sluggish economic growth.

"By 2035, an education power will be built," the official Xinhua news agency said, adding that China would explore gradually expanding the scope of free education, increase "high-quality" undergraduate enrolment, expand postgraduate education, and raise the proportion of doctoral students.

The plan aims to promote "healthy growth and all-round development of students," making sure primary and secondary school students have at least two hours of physical activity daily, to effectively control the myopia, or nearsightedness, and obesity rates.

"Popularizing" mental health education and establishing a national student mental health monitoring and early warning system would also be implemented, it said.

It also aims to narrow the gap between urban and rural areas to improve the operating conditions of small-scale rural schools and improve the care system for children with disabilities and those belonging to agricultural migrant populations.

The plan also aims to steadily increase the supply of kindergarten places and the accessibility of preschool education.

The Open Notebook, a site focusing on educating journalists who cover science, has complied a list of U.S. graduate program financial aid information for international students.

Read it here.