On student visas

Most of the nearly 850,000 nonimmigrant foreigners who attend U.S. colleges and universities in a given year add greatly to the educational experience of American students. They also bolster international relations by returning to their homelands with a better understanding of how this nation works. Unfortunately, as Sept. 11 made clear, the system that oversees foreign students must give priority to contending with the handful who would take advantage of this nation's openness to attack it.

Congress has belatedly ordered the Immigration and Naturalization Service to develop an electronic system to keep track of foreign students.

The INS' Student and Exchange Visitor Information System would use a Web-based database that would link U.S. embassies and consulates abroad with every INS port of entry and the 70,000 schools and other institutions eligible to admit foreign students. Lawmakers need to keep establishment of that system on schedule, making sure it is up and running by the Jan. 1, 2003, deadline. ...

-- Los Angeles Times