Organizing student arrivals for the Fall 2021 semester may be one of the most difficult tasks in NYU Abu Dhabi’s recent history. This academic year, NYUAD is welcoming the largest number ever of first year students as well as the largest number of visiting students. At the same time, NYUAD is facing unprecedented delays in entry permit processing for new students and returning students who were not on campus last year. This delay, coupled with constantly shifting travel restrictions, has resulted in many students still being at home as classes begin.

As classes started on Aug. 29, 70 percent of students had made it to campus. The rest of the students still wait anxiously in their home countries, uncertain of when or if they will receive the necessary entry permits and flight itineraries to make it to campus at all this semester.

On Aug. 15, Student Mobility hosted a Q&A session for students about fall arrivals, where they announced that all flights would be cancelled for students with missing entry permits through Aug. 24.

Emma Miklášova, Class of 2025 from Slovakia, was one of the students whose flight was cancelled after this announcement. She received her entry permit on Aug. 26 after waiting several weeks, but was given only two days’ notice of her flight itinerary, causing her to scramble to complete necessary PCR tests and travel to the airport five hours from her home.

Matab Masha, Class of 2025 from Saudi Arabia, was also affected by this announcement, with her Aug. 18 flight being cancelled. She has now received her entry permit as of Aug. 27, but still awaits her flight itinerary. In addition to the stress of rebooking travel, she has flagged typos in her name on her travel support letter, and despite multiple emails, has not heard if this will be an issue at the airport.

The adverse effects of delayed entry permits were not felt solely by first-years. Sodgerel Mandakhnaran, Class of 2024 from Mongolia, received his entry permit 22 days after his planned departure date.

“As an upperclassman waiting on an entry permit, I felt very much like a freshman all over again. It has delayed my arrival for over three weeks,” said Mandakhnaran. “I was extremely anxious that I won't get there on campus on time and it would mess up my academics.”

Delayed entry permits also impacted students’ financial standing, not only their academics and wellbeing. “Due to the issues with my local airline and Student Mobility, my family had to book my flight for me even though I receive full travel support from NYUAD,” said Mandakhnaran. “Ever since the stipend was discontinued, my finances took a hard hit. Having to book my own flight makes it worse.”

The struggles of Fall 2021 arrivals extend beyond entry permits, including sudden changes to Green List countries and quarantine requirements as well as other logistical difficulties. Grace Pedroza, Class of 2025 from the United States, received her entry permit on Aug. 10 — relatively early compared to many of her classmates. Because she booked her own flight to Abu Dhabi, she thought the process would be quite smooth, especially as her parents had decided to travel with her to campus. However, just hours before landing, the United States had been taken off the Green List and required her to quarantine for 10 days.

“I had to quarantine on campus — I couldn’t see my parents and feared that my last encounter with them would be at the airport,” said Pedroza.

Given the sudden Green List change, Pedroza was entirely unprepared to complete a 10 day quarantine. She had not brought supplies, nor had she had been briefed on specific arrival and quarantine procedures.

Aarushi Prasad, Class of 2025 from India, has her flight cancelled due to not receiving an entry permit and is also still awaiting news. Although Prasad has not yet traveled to campus, she spoke about the experiences of many of her peers who arrived at the Abu Dhabi airport and were not greeted by the PEARL Assist team that was promised to first-year students in an Aug. 5 email, forcing the students to go through the arrival process independently. Many of them also were unable to locate shuttle services to campus and had to take taxis to arrive on campus.

Many first year and visiting students have also reported struggling with obtaining ICA approval, uploading vaccine certificates to the Al Hosn app and getting the necessary Green Pass to enter different Abu Dhabi establishments. Many of these services require active UAE phone numbers or Emirates ID information that cannot be obtained until after students have arrived and completed quarantine.

Study abroad semesters for NYUAD students have also resumed for the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic began in Spring of 2020, but not without a litany of difficulties.

One student, who chose to remain anonymous, spending the semester at the NYU New York campus had a particularly stressful travel experience. The student had requested an early arrival date of Aug. 4 as travel restrictions in their country continued to tighten and students were not expected to travel to New York until Aug. 28. After the request, the student received an email noting that the request had been made, but heard nothing more until Aug. 3, one day before the requested flight date. Only 25 hours in advance of the flight time, the student was told by the ticketing agency that the flight had been booked and the student would need to quickly pack and complete a travel PCR.

Davit Jintcharadze, Class of 2022 from Georgia, spending the semester at NYU London, had travel difficulties as well. The U.K. had changed its policies so that only residents and citizens could enter if they traveled from or transited through a red country. Jintcharadze’s ticket was booked through Turkey, a red list country, meaning that he would be unable to enter the U.K. as he was neither a resident nor citizen.

It took days of communications with the ticketing agency to convince them that he would not be allowed to transit through Turkey, and attempting to do so would jeopardize his semester abroad. Jintcharadze expressed his frustration that it felt like his responsibility to inform the travel company of international travel restrictions.

Some students recognize that the delay in entry permit processing and other restriction changes are not the fault of NYUAD or any of its departments. Global Education and Student Mobility are processing visas and travel for more students than they ever have before. However, students also expressed frustration with the lack of responsiveness for inquiries, especially over email, and the format for announcements.

“My biggest frustration is probably communication from NYUAD, since they didn't let us know any specific dates and they announced the cancelation of our flights during an optional town hall,” shared Miklášova.

Azaz Ur Rehman, Class of 2025 from Pakistan, initially planned to fly on Aug. 19, but his flight was also cancelled. Now, two weeks later, he still doesn’t have any news about his permit and shared that the process has been very anxiety inducing.

“I haven’t slept well in quite a while because I’m just hoping each and every moment that Global Ed will email at some point and I have to be awake when they email me,” said Rehman. He also worries that he and other Pakistani students have not yet received their permits as Covid-19 cases continue to increase and many cities enter lockdown once again, possibly preventing them from leaving the country.

Minwu Kim, Class of 2022 from South Korea, is still at home waiting for his entry permit, and expressed his feelings that the student body is losing trust in the university as issues with travel continue, especially in the wake of recent changes to financial aid.

“What I hope is that this is a transitory issue due to the pandemic and I really wish everything could be stabilized soon,” said Kim.

Rehman expressed his frustration with how late students learned about entry permit delays, sharing that he would have considered taking a leave of absence to complete an internship at home or another opportunity while waiting for pandemic restrictions to ease.

As the wait for entry permits and flights drags on, some students start to lose optimism but cling to the community for support.

“The fact that some classes are becoming fully online even for people on campus makes one feel sad,” said Matab. “Freshmen are trying to stand with each other and help one another be patient. We have a WhatsApp group for permitless and ticketless people where people can rant, ask questions, and celebrate news about their permits and flights.”

Rehman shared that some friends are considering alternatives as serious as withdrawing from NYUAD, as they try to navigate the uncertainty of whether they’ll ever make it to campus this semester.