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BY THE NUMBERS

EDITOR’S NOTE

Dear Parents and Guidance Counselors,

The past two weeks brought a proposed $70,000 fee on international students’ post-graduation work authorization, new federal scrutiny of nine research universities, a Justice Department finding about admissions at UCLA’s law school, and the earliest FAFSA launch in history. Different agencies, different targets — but one shared effect: more uncertainty for families trying to plan.

My job in this edition is to separate signal from noise. Several of these items are proposals, allegations, or findings that have not yet been tested in court, and I have labeled them that way. Where the facts are contested, I have tried to give you the strongest case on each side before offering my own read.

With Early Action and Early Decision deadlines about three weeks away, the most practical guidance is in the Action Guide at the end. If you read nothing else, read that. Then reply and tell me what you would like covered next.

— Dr. Nathan Hurwitz

College Admissions Consultant · Hurwitz Consulting · (203) 613-9262

THIS EDITION’S COVERAGE

A $70,000 Price Tag on Post-Graduation Work: DHS Targets OPT

A proposed rule would make schools pay to recommend students for Optional Practical Training, while a separate visa-duration rule sits in court limbo.

The Department of Homeland Security has proposed a rule that would require a school to pay $70,000 the first time it recommends a student for Optional Practical Training (OPT), the program that lets international students work in jobs related to their field of study. Each later recommendation, including STEM OPT extensions, would cost $30,000, according to an immigration-law analysis of the proposal. Schools, not students, would pay up front, though the same analysis notes they could try to recover the cost from students, employers, or other funding sources.

DHS says the fees would deter fraud, strengthen oversight, and reduce reliance on OPT as a long-term employment pathway; the Associated Press reports the department described the program as a “pipeline for cheap foreign labor.” By DHS’s own estimate, about 194,000 students were on OPT and 95,000 on STEM OPT in 2024, and the fees could total $8.4 billion to $16.5 billion a year. The department also acknowledges some schools might stop funding OPT altogether. NAFSA, the international-education association, warned that driving students away would harm American innovation and economic growth.

The proposal is not final. Reports differ on the length of the public comment window, so check the Federal Register notice for the exact deadline. If a final rule follows, the fee would apply to recommendations made 60 days after publication, and the rule could face legal challenges. Separately, the DHS rule that would have replaced “duration of status” with a fixed stay of up to four years was blocked nationwide by a federal judge in Massachusetts in mid-September. DHS has appealed to the 1st Circuit; until that is resolved, duration of status remains in effect.

Washington Widens Its Lens on Elite Campuses: J-1 Probes and a Harvard Subpoena

Nine universities face Labor Department subpoenas over research visas, the EEOC asks a court to enforce a subpoena against Harvard, and courts continue to referee.

Vice President JD Vance, who chairs the administration’s fraud task force, announced that nine universities are under investigation for allegedly misusing the J-1 exchange-visitor program to bring in foreign workers who undercut American wages. The Labor Department’s inspector general, Anthony D’Esposito, is leading the probe and says it will examine whether visa abuse, foreign influence, or improper financial relationships are compromising federally funded research. Subpoenas have been served. Brown said its subpoena seeks records on federal foreign-labor programs, and MIT described its own as “very broad.”

Vance cited J-1 use on federally funded grants at about 61 percent at the named schools versus 38 percent nationally, and claimed American graduate students earn roughly $20,000 more than J-1 holders. Those are officials’ claims; no findings of wrongdoing have been made. Stanford, Brown, Arizona State, and MIT each say they follow visa law, and several note that the government vets every J-1 participant.

On a parallel track, the EEOC asked a federal court on Sept. 29 to enforce a subpoena against Harvard in an investigation of whether its faculty-diversity goals amount to race and sex discrimination in hiring, a charge filed by EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas in April 2025. Harvard says the subpoena contains more than 700 requests, that it has already produced more than 9,000 pages, and that the demand is a “fishing expedition” and retaliatory. Courts, meanwhile, are not rubber stamps: a judge dismissed the Justice Department’s challenge to Virginia’s in-state tuition laws for undocumented students in a ruling reported Oct. 8, the second such dismissal, though DOJ has prevailed in six other states.

DOJ Says UCLA Law Used Race in Admissions — and Points to Personal Statements

The finding adds another University of California program to the Justice Department’s list and puts a spotlight on how essays are read.

On Oct. 1, the Justice Department announced a finding that UCLA’s law school discriminated against white and Asian applicants and favored Black and Latino applicants in the 2023, 2024, and 2025 admissions cycles, in violation of federal law. DOJ has made similar accusations against UC Berkeley’s law school and the medical schools at UCLA and UC San Diego. Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the Civil Rights Division, called it a “two-tiered admissions system.” UCLA disputes the finding and says its review process is comprehensive and merit-based.

The reasoning matters beyond law school. DOJ argues that colleges use personal statements and other proxies to weigh race, and it cited a gap in average LSAT scores between admitted Black and white applicants. The 2023 Supreme Court decision ended race-conscious admissions, but it still allows schools to consider an applicant’s own account of how race has affected their life, so long as it is tied to a specific quality of character or ability.

The finding opens the door to a voluntary resolution requiring UCLA to follow DOJ’s reading of the law; if no agreement is reached, the department could sue. No court has ruled. The same legal line governs undergraduate admissions, which is why this case is worth watching even if your student never plans to apply to law school.

FAFSA Opens at Record Speed — But Many Colleges Haven’t Filed Their Own Outcomes Data

The 2027–28 form launched Sept. 23, the earliest in history, as the Education Department reports more than 1,000 colleges missed an outcomes-data deadline.

The 2027–28 FAFSA opened to all students on Sept. 23, 2026, beating last year’s record launch by a day. The Education Department says most families can finish in about 15 minutes, with plainer language, text invitations for parents and other contributors, a simpler renewal process, a new fraud-detection system, and a display of potential earnings outcomes for schools a student is considering. For seniors, this is the form that governs aid for fall 2027.

The earnings information families may see depends on institutions doing their own reporting, and many have not. Inside Higher Ed reports that just over 1,000 colleges missed the Oct. 1 deadline for fully submitting required student-outcomes data. The department’s Oct. 8 update lists 1,396 institutions missing files for the 2024 and 2025 reporting cycles, down from 1,930 in August, and about 37 percent (1,726) missing at least one file across all three cycles.

The final deadline is Jan. 15, 2027, and the department says it will not be extended; Federal Student Aid warns that noncompliant institutions’ access to federal grants and loans “could be at risk.” The reporting does not spell out whether the missing files directly affect what the FAFSA displays, so treat that connection as unconfirmed. The takeaway for families is simpler: an earnings figure is one input, and it may be incomplete.

Is Your College Choice Financially Sound? Massachusetts Raises the Bar on Closure Warnings

Early-notice rules, budget-driven job cuts, and a fall dip in international enrollment all point to the same advice: vet a college’s finances before you deposit.

Massachusetts announced new rules at a meeting on Sept. 30: private colleges must alert students by Dec. 31 each year if they may fail to meet their financial obligations within 18 months. The state will also add fiduciary training for leaders of at-risk institutions, bring in outside financial experts, and strengthen closure contingency planning, including transfer pathways and teach-out budgets. The changes follow two 2026 closures. Anna Maria College announced it would close less than two weeks after the state alerted the public to its finances in April, and Hampshire College announced its closure the same month without prior state warning, then secured a multimillion-dollar loan to operate through the fall term. Regulators noted that leaders often wait until spring deposit deadlines to decide whether they can survive another year.

The pressure is not limited to small privates. Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania, formed by merging Bloomsburg, Lock Haven, and Mansfield, says it could eliminate about 175 positions to address a $17 million operating deficit, with cuts completed by June 30, 2027. Its estimated fall headcount is 10,169, which is 82 below its goal.

Fall enrollment data show another strain. Ohio State’s overall enrollment rose 1.4 percent, yet its international enrollment fell 12.7 percent to 5,234. Indiana University’s international enrollment fell 15.6 percent to 4,763, and the University of North Texas lost more than 1,300 international students. Because international students typically pay full sticker price, declines can squeeze budgets even when total headcount grows. Cited causes include the federal crackdown on visas and, in Indiana, a new state law requiring background checks for certain international students.

GUIDANCE COUNSELOR CORNER

A Note for Those Who Advise Families

On the OPT proposal and the visa-duration ruling: If you advise international or mixed-status families, give them two concrete steps this month: have them check their I-94 for a “D/S” notation, and have them ask each prospective school, in writing, whether it intends to support OPT if the fee rule is finalized. Both the OPT proposal and the duration-of-status appeal are unresolved, so the honest message is “plan for uncertainty, don’t panic.” Please also remind students that the J-1 and Harvard stories this edition involve allegations and subpoenas, not findings.

On essays and the DOJ’s UCLA Law finding: Expect students to ask whether they should write about identity at all. The legal line has not changed since 2023: students may write about how their experiences shaped their character, but the essay works best when it is specific and concrete rather than categorical. Steer seniors toward one real story told in detail, and keep testing decisions deliberate rather than reactive.

On the FAFSA launch and college financial health: The early FAFSA gives you a rare opportunity to get seniors’ aid applications done before the holiday crunch. Pair that with a simple due-diligence habit: have students ask each college about recent cuts, accreditation status, and teach-out arrangements, and compare net price instead of sticker price. With more than 1,000 colleges behind on federal outcomes reporting, remind families that earnings figures are a starting point, not a verdict.

Forward freely with attribution to Higher Ed Insider and Hurwitz Consulting — if this is useful to a colleague, a PTA group, or a family you know, please pass it along.

FOR FAMILIES

Your Action Guide — Edition 2026-24

Dr. Hurwitz’s Analysis · Sept. 26 – Oct. 9, 2026

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hurwitzadmissions.com  ·  nathan@hurwitzadmissions.com  ·  (203) 613-9262

Hurwitz Consulting · The Tutor Duo  |  Sources are linked in each story. Allegations and proposals are labeled as such.

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