Late last month, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem sent a letter to Harvard revoking its authority to host student and other nonimmigrant visa holders—posing a threat not only to the university’s finances but also to America’s reputation as a destination for world-class education.
Harvard may win against Trump in the ongoing lawsuit to block the revocation, but the reputational damage is already done. The uncertainty of whether a similar move can take place again and against other “uncooperative” universities may loosen the tight grip of elite American schools, particularly over the most ambitious and intelligent youths in Asia.
Last year, Asian countries made up seven of the top ten that send the most students to American universities, with China and India representing 54% of all foreign students in America. Many remain in America after graduation, their talents powering American innovation in fields such as AI.
Educational brand-building needs to think like a business
As the likes of Harvard are distracted by their conflict with the Trump Administration, Asian universities have an opportunity to claw back some of the top talent they lost to America by upping their sheen in the eyes of their native youngsters. The region’s top schools will do well to look to successful business enterprises, including Harvard, to build educational brand names that are aspirational, inclusive, yet reachable.
They will have their work cut out. As a Veblen good, the demand for an elite university education increases the more exclusive and hard-to-attain a place in the university becomes. But unlike a Rolex or a Lamborghini, the currency of a Harvard degree is not measured in monetary terms but intellectual ones.
The fact that money cannot buy admissions into top colleges only serves to increase their status in the many Asian families soaked in the Confucian thought linking linkage with moral righteousness and noble wisdom. In this line of logic, Chinese universities’ brands, in particular, have continued to suffer in recent years, as their exclusivity is hurt by cycles of expanding enrollment.
Last year, Asian countries made up seven of the top ten that send the most students to American universities, with China and India representing 54% of all foreign students in America.
Moreover, unlike a startup in a field of cutting-edge technology, an educational institution cannot rapidly signal high quality through a combination of massive R&D investment and diligent product feedback loops. The “tradition of excellence” top institutions boast of comes from a multi-generational cast of alumni whose publicized success did not emerge until decades after graduation and is tied not only to their talents, but America as an uninterrupted source of economic dynamism and intellectual innovation. The attractive brand of higher education in America is rooted in a history that Asian universities are powerless to replicate.
Asian universities need to brand innovatively
So, how can Asian universities leverage the current window of opportunity to wrest talent from their American rivals? Exploring alternative ideas for what makes for a “strong” university brand can help.
The first is highlighting “success” in ways that need not rely on tradition but still can resonate with a new generation of youths. Top American colleges have indeed produced notable scions of American business, law, and politics, but those successes increasingly mean little to Asian students who face ever-higher barriers for even legal immigration to America.
Asian universities can highlight how a new generation of Asian successful stories starts much closer to home. It is encouraging to see, for instance, how Zhejiang University’s success in incubating AI pioneer DeepSeek has encouraged other universities in the region to set up their venture capital funds, hoping for a boon in brand-building from commercializing local innovation.
It remains to be seen whether Asian universities can brand in ways that show their distinctiveness from American counterparts, sending a clear message that they can provide quality education that is just as good, if not better, than schools elsewhere.
The second is piggybacking on the brand names of American universities, while emphasizing the lack of any downsides associated with living in America. If students are convinced that local schools offer all the perks of American educational resources, they may not be keen on physically going to America and face the uncertainties of changing visa rules, not to mention longstanding grievances such as high living costs and gun violence.
Schools such as NYU Shanghai and Yale-NUS College have directly utilized American college names, while others like Singapore Management University and Akita International University were set up with explicit partnerships with American institutions. More Asian schools may follow suit, importing English-language American liberal arts curricula to acquire an international sheen.
It remains to be seen whether Asian universities can brand in ways that show their distinctiveness from American counterparts, sending a clear message that they can provide quality education that is just as good, if not better, than schools elsewhere.
While avoiding the unassailable strength of America – namely, its academic tradition, economic dynamism, and exclusivity – Asian universities can help define, not just for themselves but international benchmarks for decades to come, what other concrete results people should look for and acquire from enrolling. Only then can they move the needle on entrenched mindsets of aspirations among the region’s most intelligent youngsters.
