US orders verification of student visas for newly arriving students
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Homeland Security Department ordered border agents ‘‘effective immediately’’ to verify that every international student who arrives in the U.S. has a valid student visa, according to an internal memorandum obtained Friday by The Associated Press. The new procedure is the government’s first security change directly related to the Boston bombings.
The order from a senior official at U.S. Customs and Border Protection, David J. Murphy, was circulated Thursday and came one day after the Obama administration acknowledged that a student from Kazakhstan accused of hiding evidence for one of the Boston bombing suspects was allowed to return to the U.S. in January without a valid student visa.
The student visa for Azamat Tazhayakov had been terminated when he arrived in New York on Jan. 20. But the border agent in the airport did not have access to the information in the Homeland Security Department’s Student and Exchange Visitor Information System, called SEVIS.
Tazhayakov was a friend and classmate of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Tazhayakov left the U.S. in December and returned Jan. 20. But in early January, his student-visa status was terminated because he was academically dismissed from the university.
Tazhayakov and a second Kazakh student were arrested this week on federal charges of obstruction of justice. They were accused of helping to get rid of a backpack containing fireworks linked to Tsarnaev. A third student was also arrested and accused of lying to authorities.
A spokesman for the department, Peter Boogaard, said earlier this week that the government was working to fix the problem, which allowed Tazhayakov to be admitted into the country when he returned to the U.S.
Under existing procedures, border agents could verify a student’s status in SEVIS only when the person was referred to a second officer for additional inspection or questioning. Tazhayakov was not sent to a second officer when he arrived, because, Boogaard said, there was no information to indicate Tazhayakov was a national security threat. Under the new procedures, all border agents were expected to be able to access SEVIS by next week.
The government for years has recognized as a problem the inability of border agents at primary inspection stations to directly review student-visa information. The Homeland Security Department was working before the bombings to resolve the problem, but the new memo outlined interim procedures until the situation was corrected.
Under the new procedures, border agents will verify a student’s visa status before the person arrives in the U.S. using information provided in flight manifests. If that information is unavailable, border agents will check the visa status manually with the agency’s national targeting data center.
It is unclear what impact the new procedure will have on wait times at airports and borders. Customs officials will be required to report any effect, including increased wait times, on a daily basis.
The Obama administration announced an internal review earlier this week of how U.S. intelligence agencies shared sensitive information before the bombings and whether the government could have prevented the attack. Republicans in Congress have promised oversight hearings, which begin Thursday.
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, asked Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on Thursday for details from the student-visa applications of Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev, the Kazakhstan students implicated in helping Tsarnaev after the bombings, including information about how Tazhayakov re-entered the United States.
Lawmakers and others have long been concerned about terrorists exploiting the student visa system to travel to the United States. A 20-year-old college student from Saudi Arabia was arrested in Texas in 2011 on federal charges of attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction. Authorities accused him of plotting to blow up dams, nuclear plants or the Dallas home of former President George W. Bush. He was later convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Emerson College launches a minor in radio at School of Communication
Emerson College’s award-winning radio station, WERS-FM (88.9), brands itself as a place to discover new music, but students interested in radio news and music discovered two years ago that the college’s Visual and Media Arts Department had discontinued radio as a major track. But now Emerson has created a minor in radio in its School of Communication.
“Emerson is tuition driven, so programs are very responsive to student demand,” said Phillip Glenn, Professor and Interim Dean of the School of Communication. “Yet we have WERS, and we have a lot of students who are excited about not only radio but audio content. That was the genesis then of the idea to start this radio minor.”
About two years ago, the college decided to ditch radio as a major track in the Visual, Media Arts department due to a lack of student interest. Since then, with the help of the WERS General Manager Jack Casey and the support of faculty members in the Journalism and Communications Studies departments, the radio program has been brought back as a minor in the School of Communication.
“It makes sense professionally because radio as an industry is in such economic transformation,” said Glenn. “The forecasts are there aren’t that many careers or jobs, but it could be a piece of a lot of people’s media profiles and a lot of people just have a passion for it.”
Casey said, “I think there was a question in the minds of some people at the college about the future viability of radio as a career path. That’s understandable given the huge amount of cut-backs that have ensued in the business, but I think we all agreed that there are lots of opportunities to produce audio content not just through traditional terrestrial radio but satellite radio, podcasting, HD and eventually internet radio where we all feel its going to go.”
WERS-FM, a student-run and professionally managed station, remains successful in the Boston area, and its its news department won ten Associated Press awards in 2013.
The radio program’s move from the Visual, Media Arts department to the School of Communications means there will be some changes in the structure and focus of the radio program.
“VMA of course is heavily involved in production, and that’s part of this new minor, but it’s a sampling of all aspects of the radio business” said Glenn.
Courses for the minor will span various aspects of radio. The college plans to offer classes in audio programming content, marketing, promotions and sales, writing and producing for radio, business and finance for media and a performance course that will give students experience behind a microphone.
“That draws on different departments in the School of Communications so that’s one difference,” said Glenn of the change. “It’s explicitly an interdisciplinary approach to radio.”
The program will be primarily led by Casey, whose current classes in radio programming and radio marketing and promotions are the only remaining courses from the pre-existing major. These two courses will be transitioned over to the new minor with a few updates to the curriculum.
“Our goal is to give people the requisite skills to get hired in that all important first job,” said Casey. “So they can present themselves as being well rounded and so that they can feel secure about the skillsets that they have and that those are appropriate to the industry.”
The college plans to roll out five courses for the twenty credit minor, starting one in the Fall of 2013 and another in the Spring of 2014. The goal is for students to be able to complete the entire program over two years.
“There are still plenty of stations that are hiring people and I don’t think that’s going to go away, it’s just not as easy as it was twenty years ago,” said Casey. “We feel that the college is very much behind this and we’re looking forward to launching it.”
This article is being published under an arrangement between the Boston Globe and Emerson College.
BC partners with six other schools, including Brandeis, to offer for-credit online classes
Boston College will partner with six other universities this fall to offer for-credit classes as part of an on-line initiative, BC officials announced today.
In addition to BC, “Semester Online” will feature courses from Brandeis University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Northwestern University, the University of Notre Dame, Washington University in St. Louis, and Emory University.
These courses, in conjunction with the on-line educator provider 2U, will cover a range of topics from accounting to film, BC said in a statement.
“It is an exciting opportunity to explore this consortial approach to online undergraduate education and share our teaching excellence with a wider audience in partnership with peer schools and the nation’s leader in online education,” said BC Provost and Dean of Faculties Cutberto Garza.
The statement said the courses will be available to “academically qualified students” who are attending the universities in the consortium and other schools in the United States. To apply for a class, students must be in good academic standing and enrolled in a four-year, regionally accredited school.
Students attending universities in the consortium will pay standard tuition rates, and students from outside colleges will pay per class, the statement said. According to Jack Dunn, a spokesman for BC, the cost will be $4,200 for one course.
Unlike Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, these classes will be capped at approximately 20 students.
Brandeis announced its involvement with the initiative in November.
“This consortium will expand opportunities for students everywhere and will help us all gain experience and understanding of the broad potential of distance learning," Brandeis Provost Steve A.N. Goldstein said in a statement. "We're looking forward to this exploration of the on-line world."
BC will offer two courses this fall: “How to Rule the World,” taught by political science professor Robert Bartlett, and “Vietnam: America’s War at Home and Abroad” instructed by associate professor of history Seth Jacobs.
Katherine Landergan can be reached at klandergan@globe.com. For campus news updates, follow her on Twitter @klandergan.
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Tufts University expands student healthcare plan to include gender reassignment surgery
Tufts University has adopted a new healthcare plan that includes benefits for transgender students, making Tufts the 37th university or college in the country to offer health insurance of this kind, according to university officials.
Michelle Bowdler, the senior director of health and wellness services at Tufts, said that these benefits will include coverage of hormone treatment and gender reassignment surgeries.
“These are needs that are absolutely a medical necessity,” she said Friday in a phone interview.
Bowdler said that although only a small number of students will use these benefits, Tufts is an inclusive school and wants all its students to have access to a non-discriminatory health plan.
Emerson College and Harvard University have similar health plans, according to the Human Rights Campaign website.
At Tufts, the cost of adding the benefits was minimal, Bowdler said, but Tufts had to negotiate with the insurance companies. Many healthcare plans do not cover treatments and surgeries for transgender patients.
Bowdler said she hopes that other universities will follow suit, or at least consider adding counseling and hormone treatment for transgender people into health coverage plans, because the extra cost is extremely minimal.
“It’s just about taking care of the health needs of all of our students,” she said.
Tom Bourdon, the director of the Tufts University LGBT Center, said that since the university announced its new health plan, more students who are questioning their gender identity have approached him for advice.
He said that students are saying that “I feel a little more safe about talking about this.”
Bourdon also said that he has been contacted by two schools that are interested in adopting similar plans.
“When one school does it, it makes it easier for other schools,” he said of instituting these benefits.
Katherine Landergan can be reached at klandergan@globe.com. For campus news updates, follow her on Twitter @klandergan.
Looking for more coverage of area colleges and universities? Go to our Your Campus pages.
Emerson athletes excited to join NEWMAC conference this fall
It will be the end of an era for many Emerson College sports teams this spring.
Emerson College is preparing to move after 18 years from the Great Northeast Athletic Conference to the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference this fall, where they will face a higher level of competition that includes MIT, Babson College, Wheaton College, and the U.S. Coast Guard Academy. The only teams not making the move to the NEWMAC is the men’s volleyball team because the NEWMAC does not compete at the varsity level in that sport.
Though Emerson College Interim Athletic Director Stanford Nance expressed appreciation for the GNAC, he acknowledged Emerson had wanted to make the jump to the NEWMAC since around 2005, citing tougher competition and an academic standard in line with Emerson College.
“Obviously it’s an upgraded league,” Nance said. “There will be some trying times for us in some sports, but I think in the big picture we line up with the schools [that are] in the conference academically, and at some point in time athletically as well.”
Nance said academics are first and foremost in Division III sports and that Emerson recruits good students, not just good athletes. Emerson’s softball team had the highest average GPA of any Division III softball team in the country in 2012 at 3.59.
“One thing about being a part of this community is you attract a very high-caliber student athlete,” Nance said. “So they can express themselves in a way that’s first class. It comes with the territory of Emerson being a niche school.”
Nance said added that while Emerson’s shares the same high academic standards as other schools in the NEWMAC, he doesn’t expect much competition between the schools in terms of recruiting.
“We’re not recruiting against the teams that [are] in the league because we attract a different type of student in terms of our major,” Nance said.
Nance also made clear that while academics are first and foremost, the Lions want to win championships.
“We do want to compete for championships,” Nance said. “Don’t ever underestimate that.”
Although he acknowledged the Lions will need time to get used to playing in a new league, Nance said he expects teams with full-time coaches — such as the basketball, softball, and women’s volleyball teams — to be competitive.
“I think you’ve got to look to the full-time coaches first,” Nance said, “and then the part-time coaches. It’s a trial and error period, meaning as we hire the new full-time coaches, elevate those part-time coaches to full-time, they will have an opportunity to recruit full-time.”
Men’s basketball coach Jim O’Brien said that while the NEWMAC is a good fit for his Lions, they have a lot of work to do. The men’s basketball team featured nine freshmen this past season and finished 15-12.
“We have our work cut out for us,” O’Brien said. “We have just about our whole team returning next year, but we’re going into a league that is clearly a notch above the league that we played in this year.”
“We need to shoot the ball better,” O’Brien said. “And our guard play needs to improve. We need to rebound the ball better, we need to get stronger. I think that’s going to be a key component. Our guys are going to have to make a huge commitment to the weight room, so that we’re going to be able to physically compete against the teams we’re going to be playing against.”
Despite the improvements the needs to makes, O’Brien said he’s still looking forward to competing in the NEWMAC.
“I think that in a lot of ways it’s a good move for us. I think from an academic standpoint and from a perception standpoint, I think that it’s a great league for Emerson College,” O’Brien said. “To be rubbing elbows with academic schools like MIT and Babson and some of the other schools that we’re going in with. I think that’s a good thing.”
Lions Men’s Basketball Forward Patrick Lowndes, who also plays on the soccer team, acknowledged the work he and his fellow teammates are going to have to put in to be competitive, but that he’s unfazed by the tougher competition the team will face in the NEWMAC.
“We’re very excited,” Lowndes said. “Personally, I like playing against the best, so I’m looking forward to that.”
Bianca Buono, who plays outfield and third base for the Lions softball team, said she was looking forward to facing new challenges in the NEWMAC. The softball team finished 11-1 in conference play last season and 14-10 overall.
“Not only is the NEWMAC so much better academically, but the competition is going to be so much better, especially for the softball team,” Buono said. “We’ve had a lot of success in the regular season in [the] GNAC. The past two seasons we’ve gone 22-2 in conference play.
“It’s awesome dominating, but at the same time we’re really excited for more challenging games,” she said.
This article is being published under an arrangement between the Boston Globe and Emerson College.
Despite canceled classes, Emerson College maintains calm and sense of community
Emerson College canceled classes Friday and closed all non-residential buildings, but dining facilities operated normally and students said the school was doing a good job maintaining calm amid the massive manhunt for the second Boston Marathon bombing suspect.
The Emerson Emergency Alert system and the school administration have sent out various messages to students, faculty, and staff with updated information since the early hours of Friday morning.
Employees of the dining services were expected to come into work, despite the shut down of the MBTA.
“They’re really doing a good job at keeping students who live on campus calm,” said Nicole Sessions, who graduated in December. She lives in Cambridge but had to stay with a friend who lives near the school when she was unable to take the train home. “They are doing everything they can to give people time to handle this.”
The college had scheduled makeup days on Friday (April 19), Saturday (April 20), and Sunday (April 21) to compensate for days that class had been canceled, but the Dean of Students announced on Friday afternoon that the college will not hold the makeup classes as scheduled.
“It’s a little stressful that academics are being affected,” said freshman student Elliot Friar from in York, Maine. “But that’s not important right now, what’s important is that we are safe.”
The dining services on campus remain open with standard operating hours. Three residences halls — Paramount, the Little Building, and Piano Row — each offer a dining facility, while the fourth residence hall, Colonial does not.
Many of the restaurants around Emerson were closed.
Freshman Shekinah-Glory Beepat, from Carteret, N.J., said that despite the recent events affecting Boston, she still feels safe both in the campus and in the city.
“I love the city of Boston and this hasn’t affected the way I view Boston in any way,” said Beepat.
The college continues to have enhanced security personnel patrolling the campus.
All ArtsEmerson performances have been cancelled for Friday.
Laura Gomez can be reached at laura.gomez@globe.com.
Students in disbelief as city is on lockdown: 'It feels like the world around you is going into anarchy'
Thousands of local college students are huddling in their dorms and apartments today, listening to scanners, texting parents, and swapping stories, as police and FBI agents are on an all-out manhunt for the marathon bomber.
Ritchie Chen, a Phd student at MIT, said that he was in the library at the time of the campus shooting last night, feet away from where the police officer was shot and killed.
He did not hear the shots being fired. Minutes after the shootout, someone pulled the fire alarm. Chen said he didn’t think much of it. But when he was back inside, his friend learned of the shooting through social media.
“My friend said someone was shot, a police officer was shot,” Chen said. “I told him, it’s not April 1st anymore. You’ve got to be joking.”
Chen said he was sequestered in the library until 2 a.m. Students were mostly silent, and listening to the police scanners.
“Social media was the easiest way to keep updated,” he said. “Twitter or Facebook – that was how we found out an officer was shot, that he was hurt in the hand and belly. It was right there, like a couple feet from the library.”
Chen said he biked home, right past the crime scene. He didn’t stop to look.
Universities including MIT, Harvard, Brandeis, BU, BC, Boston Conservatory, Bentley, Suffolk, Northeastern, Simmons, Berklee, Wheelock, Wentworth Institute of Technology, Tufts, Emmanuel, and Emerson have canceled classes today.
Roger Brown, president of Berklee College of Music, issued a statement urging students to stay in their dorm rooms or apartment and said that college personnel are “doing everything in our power to keep our students, faculty, and staff safe.”
“I am very proud of and confident in our security team, and we have been in continued contact through the night and morning,” he said in the statement. “I know we all look forward to being able to put this behind us, but for now, the key is to allow law enforcement personnel to do their jobs.”
At Northeastern University, final exams that were scheduled for today have been pushed back.
"We are working closely with the deans and the faculty to develop alternative arrangements so students can complete all of their work in the coming days," the university said in an e-mail to students. "We will continue to provide updates as new schedules are being developed."
At Emerson College, officials are coming up with creative ways to help students finish the semester after the unexpected shortened work week. Dean of Students Ron Ludman wrote in a message to the community that "as soon as it is reasonably possible, each faculty member will communicate with the students in his or her class a flexible plan to complete successfully spring semester course work."
In the message, a few solutions were proposed, including, "Allow each student to receive a grade for the term based on evaluations done to date; Allow students to complete the semester by sending completed projects to one’s faculty at a later date certain, providing an Incomplete for this semester with a grade registered after evaluation of the paper or project; and Allow students to develop individual agreements for academic situations that do not fall into the above categories."
Mary Kate Hennelly, a sophomore at Boston College said that she has been awake with eight of her friends since 10 p.m. thursday night, following the man-hunt as its unfolding.
"We’ve been on a combination of police scanners, t.v., and twitter," she said.
Hennelly said the group is exhausted and very concerned.
"I think right now we are just all pretty tired," she said. "Tiredness punctuated with tension."
Although Hennelly said the week has felt tumulteous, she and her friends have been touched by the outpouring support from friends and family.
"That's the beautiful thing," she said.
Molly Flynn, a junior Simmons College, said she stayed awake all night listening to the police chase and shootout on the scanners.
“I’ve been awake since 9:30 a.m. yesterday,” Flynn said. “Once [the shootout] happened, it’s just adrenaline.”
Flynn, who is at her apartment in the Back Bay, said she always has considered Boston to be a very safe city. After witnessing the bombings on Monday, she has cried every day.
“I’ve been crying a little bit in the morning, and I never cry,” she said. “It’s really an uncontrollable thing.”
Sarah Campbell, a student at Boston University, said she and her dorm mates feel that although staying indoors is tiring, it's an important safety measure.
"It's not getting any worse for [the suspect] the longer he stays out there," she said. "It could get worse for us" if we were outside.
Campbell, 19, said she was at the finish line at the time of the explosions. She was hit with a large piece of debris, but was left uninjured.
"It instantly turned to total chaos," she said of Monday's bombings.
As the week went on, Campbell said she started to process what had happened. But today has set her back.
"Waking up, hearing that the two guys are the same ones that carried out the bombings, it just sent me into another whirlwind."
She said that when she learned one suspect had died, she felt very conflicted.
"My emotions were haywire, because I definitely think he deserved [to die] but there should have been some justice," Campbell said.
Chen said this week has left him shaken, he said, particularly since he saw Monday’s bombings.
“It’s extremely traumatizing because I was on the Harvard Bridge running,” he said. You see this smoke and your skin is crawling.”
Chen said he is trying to follow his normal routine, but it has been difficult.
“It feels like the world around you is going into anarchy,” he said.
Katherine Landergan can be reached at klandergan@globe.com. For campus news updates, follow her on Twitter @klandergan.
Looking for more coverage of area colleges and universities? Go to our Your Campus pages.
Emerson College community shows unity after students injured in Marathon blast
Two days after the 117th Boston Marathon ended in shrapnel and blood, the Emerson College community gathered Wednesday morning at the Cutler Majestic Theater to reflect on events that left eight students injured.
Administrators, students, faculty and staff shared a message of unity, camaraderie, defiance in the face of fear, and gratitude for the safety of friends and family.
“We are Emerson College and Emerson College is us,” President Lee Pelton said. “We are resilient and defiant in the face of evil and destruction. This is our legacy to the city, to the nation and to the world.”
The gathering brought together a diverse crowd of past and present Emerson students. Several took the floor to share their thoughts and experiences.
Senior Lauren Cortizo, who ran in the marathon along with a few other Emerson students, said she has felt more love in the past 48 hours than she has ever felt in her life.
"Emerson is amazing," she said.
Cortizo was in tears by the end of her brief speech.
Emerson sophomores Christian Bergren and Brendan Scully, who ran with her that day, flanked her as she spoke. The two wore bright blue jackets with the Boston Athletic Association logo emblazoned on the back.
“When a tragedy like the Boston bombing occurs, the entire community is affected,” said Emerson’s Counseling Center Director Elise Harrison. “Our sense of security is shaken.”
Seven Emerson students were injured in the twin explosions, though all were released from the hospital the same day. Pelton recalled visiting them in the hospital, where some shed tears.
Some of those who spoke were far from Boston when the bombs exploded.
Katie DeWitt, an Emerson sophomore, was at the Dallas Airport. She recounted how she pieced together what was happening from Facebook statuses and Twitter posts, but she was “incredibly grateful” for Emerson’s phone and e-mail alerts.
Another student, junior Ryan Martin, recalled the immediate e-mails and messages he received from Emerson faculty.
“I felt like I was flailing around in the dark, and I felt like my teachers threw me a rope,” she said.
She urged those gathered to be kind to themselves, to turn off their TVs to avoid further trauma and set aside time to do things they find comforting.
There is no “magic Band Aid” to make it all better, said Student Government Association President Tau Zaman said. But, he added, now is the time to say what we would normally be too afraid to say, be vulnerable and openly share in our love and affection for others.
Emerson alumnus Daniel McDuffie was until recently a manager at a store less than half a block from the second blast, he said. The 35-year-old has worked and lived in Boston for the better part of a decade.
“Don’t let fear grab you,” McDuffie said. The best message we can send is that we are not afraid to go back to the beating heart of Boston.”
He urged people to support local businesses as a show of strength.
“What I’m hearing in story after story is that despair and fear did not have the last word,” said Emerson Chaplain Kristelle Angelli. “Courage and resilience did.”
Emerson College Journalism Assistant Professor Michael Brown quoted Winston Churchill, calling on those gathered to “never, ever give up.”
“I know that the 118th marathon next year will be the best marathon this city has ever seen, “ he said. “Because that’s what Bostonians do.”
Photo Douglas Yu
This article is being published under an arrangement between the Boston Globe and Emerson College.
BC students postpone marathon memorial walk, after thousands plan to attend
A walk to honor the victims of the marathon bombing's has been postponed after more than 17,000 people, mostly college students, said on Facebook that they planned to attend Friday's event.
"Out of respect for the City of Boston and the Boston Police Department, the walk originally scheduled for this Friday will be POSTPONED to a date in the future that is more appropriate and conducive to this type of an event," the creators wrote on the event page.
The new date has not been announced.
The organizers wrote on Tuesday that the route for the walk, "Boston Marathon: The Last 5," would be from Boston College to Boston. According to the BC Heights, the organizers of this memorial walk are Boston College students.
"For anyone who did not get to finish, for anyone who was injured, and for anyone who lost their life...we will walk," the event page said on Tuesday. "We will walk to show that we decide when our marathon ends."
Instead, members of the Boston College community are invited to attend a vigil on Friday. The service will be held on the O'Neill Plaza at 4 p.m.
"We encourage other universities in the Boston area, and across the country, to hold vigils at this time in a gesture of solidarity," the organizers wrote today, adding "At the appropriate time and in concert with the City of Boston, we plan to hold the Boston Marathon: The Last 5 event. Our motto remains: We decide when our marathon ends."
Three Tufts University students, seven Emerson College students, three Northeastern University students, two Boston College students, one Berklee College of Music student and a Boston University student were among those injured in Monday's bombings, according to the schools. One BU student was among those killed.
Katherine Landergan can be reached at klandergan@globe.com. For campus news updates, follow her on Twitter @klandergan.
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Chinese woman studying at Boston University "badly hurt" in Monday's attacks, consulate says
At least two Chinese students were among those injured in Monday's Boston Marathon bombings, including a student from Boston University who was "badly hurt," the Chinese consulate said Tuesday afternoon.
The Chinese consulate in New York identified the victim as BU student Zhou Danling. Chinese media said Zhou is a graduate of Wuhan University in central China, and is a student at BU in actuarial science.
"She cannot talk now but can communicate with pen and paper," the consulate said in an e-mailed statement.
In addition, the consulate said that a Chinese student who was missing after the explosions, Ms. Qian, has been found. Her condition is unknown at this time. Another Chinese student, identifed by the consultate as Ms. Lv Lingzi, is still missing. The consulate said officials they do not know the first names of these students, and are unsure whether these students are in high school or college.
Earlier Monday, Boston University's president reported that a BU student was critically injured. According to a report late Tuesday morning, the student is now in stable condition.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the families who have experienced a dreadful loss and those whose loved ones are terribly injured,” President Robert A. Brown said in a statement.
The South China Morning Post, quoting the official Chinese news agency, said some 86 registered runners in the marathon were from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Anyone with information regarding the missing Chinese student is asked call the consulate 24-hour hotline at (212) 244-9392, ext 1000.
The Chinese students were among several college students from around the region injured in the Boston Marathon explosions, administrators said Tuesday.
Three Tufts University students, seven Emerson College students, three Northeastern University students, two Boston College students, one Berklee College of Music student and one Boston University student were among those injured, according to the schools.
Boston College identifed the two injured students as M.B.A. student Liza Cherney and joint J.D./M.B.A. student Brittany Loring. "The two spectators were hospitalized with injuries resulting from the explosions near the Marathon finish line,'' the school said.
Katherine Landergan can be reached at klandergan@globe.com. For campus news updates, follow her on Twitter @klandergan.
Looking for more coverage of area colleges and universities? Go to our Your Campus pages.
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Recent blog posts
- US orders verification of student visas for newly arriving students
- Emerson College launches a minor in radio at School of Communication
- BC partners with six other schools, including Brandeis, to offer for-credit online classes
- Tufts University expands student healthcare plan to include gender reassignment surgery
- Emerson athletes excited to join NEWMAC conference this fall