I landed at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport last August to begin a semester at the University of Michigan as an exchange student from Sciences Po in France. Originally from New Delhi, I had already studied across two continents and traveled extensively, and I thought I understood what “studying abroad” meant. Two two-week visits to the United States gave me confidence. Two full semesters in the Midwest taught me something else entirely.
What I did not expect was how quickly the University’s idea of being a “global campus” would diverge with the reality of being an exchange student. This tension occurred not through hostility or exclusion, but through something quieter and more structural: policies designed for full-degree students that treat exchange students as temporary guests rather than full members of the campus community.
The University proudly markets itself as a global institution highlighting hundreds of international partnerships and study abroad programs across the globe. But for exchange students, everyday systems can quietly turn inclusion into an overpay-to-participate experience. These policies are not malicious; they are simply not built with exchange students in mind. The result is a group that contributes academically and culturally to campus life while absorbing disproportionate financial and administrative burdens.
Out of roughly 52,000 students at the University, about 8,000 are international. Exchange students make up an even smaller subset. Their small numbers make their experiences easy to overlook, even as their presence is regularly invoked in the University’s global branding.
One of the clearest examples is health insurance. Most exchange students arrive with comprehensive international coverage, often required by their home universities or visa arrangements. Despite this, the University requires enrollment in a U.S.-based health insurance plan unless a waiver is granted. In theory, waivers exist to prevent redundancy, but in practice, they are opaque, inconsistent and seemingly difficult to obtain.
Exchange students frequently find themselves paying twice for health insurance: once internationally and once domestically. This is not a marginal cost.For the 2025-26 academic year, Michigan’s Student Health Insurance plan costs $291.27 per month, nearly $3,500 for a year. While waivers are technically available, they require documentation that is often difficult to translate across international systems and clauses that are very narrow, leaving many exchange students paying for overlapping coverage. For students already navigating visa fees, transatlantic travel and expensive short-term rental markets, this added expense is significant.
The University’s rationale is usually framed around avoiding liability and ensuring adequate coverage for exchange students. Those concerns are well-intentioned, but standardization that ignores duration and student status is not fair. Exchange students are not seeking to avoid insurance requirements; they are often required to purchase additional coverage despite already meeting comparable standards abroad.
Importantly, this is not a call to dismantle existing systems. It is a call to refine them. Administrative efficiency and risk management are legitimate priorities for a university of this scale. But proportionality matters. Clearer and transparent waiver criteria and prior communication would preserve the goals of the University while reducing uncertainty and unnecessary financial strain.
Last November, I had the opportunity to represent international students on a Council for Global Engagement panel attended by the deans of several departments from U-M Ann Arbor, Flint and Dearborn campuses. The initiative was thoughtful and well-intentioned (Indeed, I brought up the insurance issue at the panel). Yet, such moments remain occasional at most, with little visible follow-up. Dialogue without institutional feedback just seems rather symbolic. Regular, formal town hall-type discussion sessions with exchange students, similar to the aforementioned, would signal that their experiences are being taken seriously.
Taken together, these policies communicate that exchange students are welcome in classrooms, but remain peripheral in institutional design. They are invited to contribute intellectually, but expected to absorb the friction of systems that are simply not built to keep them in mind.
This matters beyond individual inconvenience. Exchange students bring global perspectives into seminars, conferences and everyday campus conversations. Treating them merely as semester-long participants, rather than stakeholders, undermines the very global identity the University celebrates.
Overall, the University does not need to reinvent itself to be more inclusive; it needs to align its global branding with its operational choices. Inclusion is not only about who is welcomed, but about who the systems are designed to serve.
Shubhankar Dhulia is an Opinion Analyst who writes about Campus Life, Culture and Identity from a global, comparative perspective. His Column, “Between Worlds”, explores the Exchange Student experience at the University of Michigan. He can be reached at dhulia@umich.edu.
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