It's the moment every university student dreams of: donning the academic gown and walking on stage to collect their testamur after completing their degree.
Students at the Australian National University fear many will miss out on this milestone after the university decided to hold graduation ceremonies only once per year.
Currently the ceremonies are held in July and December for cohorts that completed their studies in the preceding semester.
The university announced in June it would move to only one session of graduation ceremonies per year in early April, with the December 2024 graduations cancelled.
The move has particularly angered international students because their visas usually expire on March 14.
The Australian National University Students' Association international officer Rishika Agrawal said some students had already booked flights for their families to attend their graduation ceremony in December.
"Their families that invested over $200,000 in their child's education want to come into the country and watch this child graduate, and that can only be possible if they do not postpone it," Ms Agrawal said.
"You can imagine, after spending so much money, after living here alone, going through all those obstacles, such a special moment you want to celebrate with your family ... and they're completely stealing this right away from all international students whose visas will expire."
She said domestic students would also be impacted by having to get leave from their graduate jobs to travel back to Canberra for their graduations up to nine months after completing their studies.
Ms Agrawal said students were unsure whether the move was motivated by a desire to cut costs and she was not aware of any consultation with international students before the decision was made.
A university spokeswoman said there had been "important and constructive feedback" from students about the change, including 120 written submissions.
"We are grateful to our students for this feedback and are taking the time to go through it properly," the spokeswoman said.
"We will be in a position to provide further updates to our community in the coming days, and will be sure to pass those updates on as soon as we are able."
Vice-chancellor Genevieve Bell told a Senate hearing last week the university had recorded $400 million in cumulative deficits since the onset of the COVID pandemic and would suffer further if it was restricted in the number of international students it could enrol under proposed legislation.
Professor Bell said the university had 10,089 international students enrolled this year.
The university missed its financial targets in 2023 by $27 million and discovered it had underpaid casual staff $2 million over 11 years due to a system error.
An online petition calling for the university to reconsider the change has attracted more than 2000 signatures within two weeks.
"Medical degree graduations in March will be when everyone is working as an intern doctor. No one from my whole cohort will be able to attend their graduation, it has effectively cancelled our graduation ceremony," a student named Henry wrote on the petition.
A student named Kazimier wrote: "This is not fair for international students to have to apply for another visa just to graduate - this makes us feel like nothing but cash cows."
Ms Agrawal said the university should go ahead with the December graduations for this year and change the dates of future graduations so international students would be able to attend.
"My urgent call is for ANU to take some action regarding this or provide some sort of relief assistance for all international students who are impacted," she said.
