Around 470 UK colleges banned from enrolling foreign students

United Kingdom, 2nd November: The UK Border Agency has revealed that more than 470 colleges in the UK have been banned from bringing international students to the nation.

This is the latest step by the UK government to control misuse of UK immigration system by a large number of educational institutes in the nation.

Ban for misusing UK immigration norms--As per the information, the banned colleges in the UK had either not signed a new inspection system or had their licenses revoked. Had these colleges abided by UK immigration norms, they might have brought in around 11,000 foreign students.

It is being stated that in majority of the banned colleges, there were no proper records showing attendance of students. And some other colleges did not provide authentic details with regard to verification of student qualification or list of enrolled students. All these loopholes point out towards misuse of UK immigration rules for admitting foreign students.

UK immigration reforms start biting--Recent reforms in the UK immigration rules have begun to bite, admitted UK immigration minister Damian Green. For long, the UK student visa rules were subject to widespread abuse from non-EU migrants, claimed Green.

Several educational institutes were moving away from their real motive of providing education to foreign students coming to the UK. Rather, they were functioning as providers of immigration service to the international students whose sole aim was to get jobs after coming to the UK and bring along their dependents here, added Green.

Licenses to first-class education providers—Green has made it quite clear that the UK must make sure to provide licenses to only first-class educational institutes in the nation for offering sponsorship to foreign students. The UK has already put on hold opportunities to employment during study and international students are not allowed to bring in their dependents while coming to the UK on student visas, he clarified.

And the introduction of new tougher English language requirements are meant to ensure that the UK attracts only the best and the genuine international students whose sole aim is to study here, he added. The UK must appear ‘open for business’ to genuine individuals wanting to study in any of the highly-regarded universities in the nation, said head of Universities UK, Nicola Dandridge.