New H-1B Visa Program: The Universities With The Most To Lose

If you’re thinking about grad school or a career in research, here’s something you should know: the H-1B visa program – which helps highly skilled foreign workers like scientists, engineers, and educators stay and work in the U.S. – is under serious pressure.

President Trump’s administration has proposed a $100,000 fee for each new H-1B visa, a massive jump from the previous $2,000-$5,000 range. While tech companies are bracing for impact, universities may feel the hit first. That’s because schools can apply for H-1Bs year-round, unlike companies that go through a capped lottery. “The universities are on the frontlines and this is just a pure tax on their pipeline,” says Jeremy Neufeld from the Institute for Progress.

The fee, plus new restrictions on student visas and post-grad work programs like OPT, could make it harder for international students to stay in the U.S. after earning advanced degrees – undermining one of the biggest draws of American higher ed.

Janet Novack at Forbes shared the top universities that have in the past relied on these visas the most, and therefore will likely feel the hit the hardest. Here are the schools that are most vulnerable to this fee.

Stanford tops the list with 500 H-1Bs issued in the first nine months of fiscal 2025, and 36% of its grad students coming from abroad. At Columbia and Washington University in St. Louis, nearly half of grad students are international. These numbers show just how global U.S. research and education really are.

With rising visa costs and tighter rules, professors say hiring is already changing. “We thought about [it] as you hire the best person for the job,” recalls Northwestern’s Jorge Coronado.

Now, Coronado adds, the fee is bound to deter international hiring. That presents a threat to American companies. As other countries ramp up efforts to attract global talent, the U.S. risks losing its edge – not because it lacks talent, but because it’s making it harder for talented professionals from overseas to stay.

In a September interview with The Guardian, Atakan Bakiskan, an economist with Berenberg, describes the increased cost as “anti-growth policymaking”.

“By making it very expensive for companies to attract foreign talent, and by forcing some international students to leave the country after graduation, the brain drain will weigh heavily on productivity. Investments in artificial intelligence are unlikely to offset the damage caused by the loss of human capital under restrictive immigration policies.”

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