UK losing attraction, Australia still leads on international students

The findings of the annual report published by OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) maintain that several new economies of the world are already rising up and even overtaking the nations which had once played a dominant role in the international education. 

Nations such as the Czech Republic, Finland and Slovakia have witnessed higher graduation rates while nations like the UK and the US have fared poorly in terms of rankings in the global league table of the most educated countries.

Other nations that have showed significantly high rates in the global league table include Sweden Poland, Iceland, Ireland and Portugal, states the “Education at a glance” report which was published this week.

The report findings reiterate that Australia still leads on international student enrollments in the tertiary institutes globally.  It was found that in the year 2008, nearly one in five students in Australia’s tertiary education hailed from overseas.

Australia leads Austria which has nearly 15.5 percent of international students followed by Belgium and Canada which had 8.6 percent and 6.5 percent foreign students in tertiary education.

The average ratings of OECD are 6.7 percent.

Every year, a large number of students move to Australia on Australia student visas to pursue different study courses available here. It may be worth mentioned that the higher education market in Australia provides a revenue of $18 billion every year to Australian economy and universities in Australia depend on international students’ fees.

Last year, there has been a significant decline in the number of Australian student visa numbers registering a drop of 16 percent. This has been largely due to strict Australian student visa norms introduced by Australian immigration department. Another reason for sharp decline in Australian student visa numbers is due to racial attacks on Indians in Australia last year.

According to a former analyst with OECD, Ben Jensen, the report is not indicating a fall in foreign student visas following crackdown on immigration, rather its showing how much dependence Australia has on international students to support university funding.