Neutral on Paper, Unequal in Practice

Image Credit: The Columbia Spectator

By Gether Minon

Since the second Trump administration took office, its stance on non-citizens has been unmistakable: Immigrants are unwelcome, regardless of their contributions or ties to this country. Against this increasingly fragile backdrop, international students must navigate not only academic pressure but also fear, uncertainty, and exclusion.

I work at Columbia’s School of General Studies, where I coordinate political advocacy efforts for underrepresented student communities, including many international students. In this role, I have witnessed how national politics translates into campus-level consequences and why meaningful advocacy requires more than statements of solidarity. 

Following the first wave of visa rollbacks and the detention of Columbia student activist Mahmoud Khalil, SIPA ‘24, I facilitated a roundtable discussion with international students across Columbia University. Within minutes, the conversation shifted from academic concerns to questions of survival. Students asked how they could assert their rights if apprehended by federal immigration agents. Others asked whether the university would intervene if their legal status was suddenly questioned.

One participant reflected: “I came to Columbia expecting academic challenges, not fear about whether I could safely remain in the United States.” That fear echoed through the room. These discussions were not abstract policy debates; they were urgent questions about safety, mobility, and belonging. In that moment, institutional assurances felt distant and procedural, while the risks students faced felt immediate. “It felt like we were being prepared to navigate the risk of being swept away alone,” said another student after a Columbia-hosted immigration Q&A session.

Universities often respond to immigration uncertainty through administrative neutrality—prioritizing compliance, documentation, and institutional risk management. Yet neutrality is not neutral when students experience unequal vulnerability. Columbia’s reliance on procedural responses, while well-intentioned, risks leaving international students to shoulder the emotional and legal consequences of political decisions alone. 

A social work lens offers an alternative—one that prioritizes protection, relational accountability, and human dignity alongside policy compliance. In practice, a social work lens should move beyond information-sharing toward active institutional advocacy. In this case, it would mean providing sustained access to immigration legal counsel rather than one-time informational sessions. It would mean integrating mental health support specifically tailored to immigration stress and publicly affirming institutional responsibility when students face federal enforcement risks. Rather than asking students to independently navigate uncertainty, the university would assume a relational role—anticipating harm, communicating transparently, and advocating alongside its students when external policies threaten their safety. 

Columbia has taken some meaningful steps, including establishing emergency funding resources and hosting informational sessions through the International Students and Scholars Office (ISSO). Yet for students facing immigration uncertainty, informational sessions alone do not resolve the deeper question of whether Columbia will stand beside them during moments of crisis.

International students do not ask for perfection. They ask to know that when uncertainty arises, their university will move beyond procedural neutrality to confront the inequality directly faced by its students. Columbia already has the intellectual tools to do so; it teaches them every day in classrooms across the School of General Studies, Social Work, and International and Public Affairs. 

The challenge now is institutional courage. Preparing students to be global leaders requires more than analyzing injustices in classrooms; it requires building a campus where their safety, dignity, and belonging are not conditional.

Leadership begins at home. If Columbia trains students to design equitable systems around the world, it must also ensure that equity shapes the lived experience of students on its own campus.