I’ve often been asked the question, “Is it difficult to get a student visa to the US after the 9/11 attacks?” Many international students are under the misguided conception that the US government has cut down on issuing student visas. This could not be further from the truth. In fact, there has never been a better time to apply for a F1 student visa to the United States as evidenced by the Open Doors 2008 report that states that the number of non-U.S. students enrolled in U.S. higher education institutions during the 2007-2008 academic year jumped 7 percent to a record total of 623,805.

The Open Doors report was published by the Institute of International Education (IIE). The report is based on a survey by IIE of nearly 2,800 accredited U.S. educational institutions. The following are the key findings from the report:

Most popular fields of study for international students: business and management (20 percent of total), engineering (17 percent) and physical and life sciences (9 percent), social sciences (9 percent), mathematics and computer sciences (8 percent)

Institutions with the highest number of international student enrollment: University of Southern California in Los Angeles (7,115), New York University (6,404), Columbia University in New York, New York (6,297), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (5,933), Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana (5,772); University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan (5,748); the University of California, Los Angeles (5,557); the University of Texas at Austin (5,550); Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts (4,948); Boston University (4,789); and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia (4,610).

Countries that sent the most number of students to the US: India (94,563), China (81,127), South Korea (69,124), Japan (33,974), Canada (29,051), Taiwan (29,001), Mexico (14,837), Turkey (12,030), Saudi Arabia (9,873), Thailand (9,004), Nepal (8,936), Germany (8,907).

States with the most number of international students: California (84,800), New York (69,844), Texas (51,824), Massachusetts (31,817), Illinois (28,804), Florida (26,739), Pennsylvania (26,090), Michigan (22,857), Ohio (19,343), and Indiana (15,548).

So what are you waiting for? Have no fear and apply for your F1 student visa to the United States.