The $70,000 OPT Fee Proposal: What It Could Change for Students, Colleges, and Jobs

Scope: This article explains a federal proposal and public responses to it. It is not immigration, legal, employment, or school-choice advice for any individual student.

For an F-1 student approaching graduation, a job offer is not the last step. The work generally has to relate to the student’s field of study; a designated school official, or DSO, must make a recommendation; and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services must approve employment authorization. That process is the ordinary machinery behind Optional Practical Training, known as OPT.

This week, that machinery became the center of a larger public argument. The Department of Homeland Security has proposed a $70,000 fee that an eligible school would have to pay before it first recommends a student for OPT, and a $30,000 fee before each later OPT recommendation for that student. The proposal was published in the Federal Register on October 8, and public comments are due November 9. It is a proposal, not a rule now in force. [1]

The people debating it are not only immigration-policy advocates. DHS is making a program-integrity and worker-protection case. College international-student offices are warning students not to treat a proposal as a final policy. The American Council on Education, a higher-education membership organization, has said the fees could put OPT out of reach for many institutions and students. [2] [4]

The human stake is not an abstract question about whether the country should have borders or whether every work program is good. It is whether a student who has completed a U.S. degree can make a realistic plan for a first job, and whether a college can responsibly tell prospective students that a work-training option will still be available when they graduate.

What OPT is—and what this proposal would change

OPT is temporary work authorization for F-1 students whose work is related to their major or course of study. ICE says eligible students can generally seek up to 12 months at each education level. Certain STEM graduates can seek a 24-month extension if they meet additional requirements, including work with an E-Verify employer and an approved training plan. A student must receive a DSO recommendation and apply to USCIS; the student cannot start work until receiving an Employment Authorization Document. [3]

That is already a supervised process, not an automatic right to take any job. It is also different from Curricular Practical Training, or CPT, which is tied to a student’s course of study and has its own rules.

The new proposal would add a large payment at the school-recommendation stage. The Federal Register notice says a school would owe $70,000 before its first recommendation for any kind of OPT for an individual student. If the same student later needs another recommendation—for example, for post-completion OPT after earlier pre-completion OPT, or for a STEM extension—the school would owe $30,000 before that later recommendation. [1]

One detail matters because early coverage can blur it: the proposed fee is not linked to a particular employer. DHS says it would attach to the school’s decision to recommend the student. A change in employer would not itself trigger the fee, but a new OPT recommendation could. Under the proposal, a DSO would have to confirm payment in SEVIS before making the recommendation, and USCIS could not grant work authorization without the applicable payment. [1] [2]

That is why a number that first sounds like an employer-hiring fee has landed so directly on colleges and students. The legal obligation in the proposal belongs to the SEVP-certified school, not the student or the employer. But the policy question is whether schools could absorb that cost, decline to make recommendations, change tuition or fee structures, or do something else. None of those outcomes is settled by the proposed rule itself.

Why DHS says the fee is needed

DHS says the proposal is meant to combat fraud and abuse, strengthen the integrity of the immigration system, and protect U.S. workers. Its October 7 announcement says the Student and Exchange Visitor Program has encountered schemes involving schools, designated officials, employers, and students, including problematic worksites and “pay-to-stay” visa arrangements. [2]

The department’s theory is that a steep school-paid fee would make institutions more selective and more attentive before backing an OPT request. DHS also says its approach responds to concerns that the program has been used as a source of cheap labor rather than as training tied to study. The department frames the policy as one part of a wider effort to protect American workers. [2]

Those are real policy concerns. A system that grants work authorization needs credible rules, records that can be checked, and consequences for institutions or employers that abuse the program. It would be misleading to describe every fraud concern as invented simply because the proposal is controversial.

But a fee designed to alter behavior also needs to be judged by what behavior it alters. The central question is whether a $70,000 school-level charge distinguishes effectively between bad actors and schools trying to administer a lawful training program. The proposed rule does not automatically answer that question; it is one reason the public-comment process exists.

Why colleges and students see a different risk

ACE’s Sarah Spreitzer told the organization that colleges would be unlikely to pay the amount directly and could pass it to students through tuition and fees. That is a prediction from a higher-education representative, not a fact established by the rule. Still, it explains why the proposal is being discussed so urgently on campuses. A school with a small international-student office is not only calculating a price. It is deciding whether it can make a promise about a professional pathway years before a student reaches graduation. [4]

The concern reaches beyond a student’s first paycheck. OPT is often how someone moves from classroom knowledge to a supervised early-career job in a field connected to the degree. For a laboratory, a technology team, a hospital research unit, a design studio, or a local employer, the value of that pathway is not identical to a permanent immigration benefit. It is a time-limited training authorization with rules, records, and an end date.

Critics of the proposal argue that a very high fee could narrow that pathway most sharply at schools with less money to spare and for students who cannot treat a future job option as a luxury. Supporters can respond that access is not the only value at stake, and that a program susceptible to abuse needs stronger safeguards. A serious debate has to hold both ideas at once: the government can pursue enforceable oversight, and the structure it chooses can still change who has a realistic chance to use a lawful program.

What is certain, what is not, and what to watch

Several things are clear. The proposal is public. It identifies the school as the party that would pay. It sets out $70,000 for an initial OPT recommendation and $30,000 for later recommendations. It gives the public until November 9 to comment through Regulations.gov under DHS Docket No. ICEB-2026-0100. [1]

Several other things are not clear because they have not happened. DHS has not issued a final rule. No school is currently required by this proposal to make the payment. There is no confirmed answer for how any specific college would absorb the cost or whether a final rule would keep the same fee amounts, timing, or structure.

The next meaningful evidence will not be a viral post claiming the program has already ended. It will be the public comments, DHS’s response to them, and any final rule. If the department makes changes, it will need to explain them in the administrative record. ACE says the proposal would take effect 60 days after publication of a final rule, but that timing matters only if DHS completes the rulemaking process. [4]

For now, the proposal is worth understanding because it turns a technical immigration form into a question about who carries the cost of oversight. That question reaches students trying to plan a first job, colleges making admissions promises, employers looking for early-career talent, and workers who want training programs to be real training rather than a loophole. The public debate is not settled by the size of one number. It is settled, if at all, by whether the final policy can show that its safeguards are targeted, workable, and honest about who will bear the consequences.

Sources & records

[1] Federal Register: Optional Practical Training Fees, 91 FR 64566, Oct. 8, 2026 — https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/10/08/2026-20660/optional-practical-training-fees

[2] U.S. Department of Homeland Security: “DHS Proposes Fees for Foreign Student Work Program to Protect American Jobs,” Oct. 7, 2026 — https://www.dhs.gov/news/2026/10/07/dhs-proposes-fees-foreign-student-work-program-protect-american-jobs

[3] U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Student and Exchange Visitor Program: “Practical Training” — https://www.ice.gov/sevis/practical-training

[4] American Council on Education: “DHS Proposes New OPT Fee as International Students Face New Restrictions,” Oct. 8, 2026 — https://www.acenet.edu/News-Room/Pages/DHS-Proposes-New-OPT-Fee.aspx