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International student mobility a
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Hans de Wit , Irina Ferencz & Laura E. Rumbley a
University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands
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University of Kassel, Germany
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Centre for International Higher Education, Boston College Version of record first published: 14 May 2012.
To cite this article: Hans de Wit , Irina Ferencz & Laura E. Rumbley (2012): International student mobility, Perspectives: Policy and Practice in Higher Education, DOI:10.1080/13603108.2012.679752 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13603108.2012.679752
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PERSPECTIVES, 1 –7, 2012, IFIRST ARTICLE
perspective International student mobility European and US perspectives Hans de Wit, Irina Ferencz and Laura E. Rumbley
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The global context The most striking trend in international student mobility over the past forty years is the increase in the number of globally circulating students, from approximately 250,000 in 1965, up to an estimated 3.7 million at present (OECD 2011: 320, UNESCO 2006: 34). These statistics primarily reflect the mobility of degree-seeking students rather than short-term ‘study abroad’ students (creditearning or otherwise) but speak to three mobility ‘waves’ in the contemporary period. The years 1975– 85 saw an increase of 30% (from 800,000 to one million). A second wave occurred between 1989 and 1994 (with an increase of 34%), and a third wave took place between 1999 and 2004 (with an increase of 4%). In the past five years, the growth – at least in absolute terms – has taken the shape of a tsunami, although in
Hans de Wit is Professor of Internationalisation of Higher Education at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam, University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands, and Director of the Centre for Higher Education Internationalisation at the Universita` Cattolica Sacro Cuore in Milan, Italy. He is the Co-editor of the Journal of Studies in International Education. Address for correspondence: Entrepotdok 206, 1018 AD Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Email: j.w.m.de.wit@hva.nl Irina Ferencz is Policy Officer at the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA) in Brussels. She is involved in several studies in different areas of international higher education and conducts her PhD studies at the University of Kassel, Germany. Address for correspondence: Email: Irina.Ferencz@ aca-secretariat.be
fairness it must be acknowledged that still only about 2% of the world student population is internationally mobile every year. Currently, according to OECD data, one can even notice a slowdown in growth: from 8% in 2007–08 to 6.4% in 2008–09 (OECD 2011: 319). Perhaps as important as the growing numbers of students is the fact that the traditional destination countries for international students – the USA, the UK, Germany, France, and Australia – face increasing competition from countries like the Russian Federation, China, Singapore, and Malaysia. Countries that send large numbers of students abroad are increasingly also becoming recipients of international students, while the growth of education ‘hubs’ in recent years in the Middle East, Asia and elsewhere is also providing new destination options for mobile students Secondly, global competition for highly skilled manpower is becoming a strong pull factor in international student circulation. The greying societies of Europe are competing with North America, Australia, and Japan for top talent around the world, as all of these countries and regions share an urgent need to fill human resource gaps in their knowledge economies. At the same time, they must compete with the emerging economies in Asia, Latin America, and Africa, which perhaps need such human resource talent even more. Thirdly, the cross-border delivery of higher education – with programmes, projects and providers instead of students moving across borders– is becoming an important growth market for the USA, Australia and the UK, Laura E. Rumbley was deputy director of the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA), and now works at the Centre for International Higher Education, Boston College. She serves on the Editorial Advisory Board for the Journal of Studies in International Education. Address for correspondence: Email: Laura.Rumbley@ aca-secretariat.be
perspectives ISSN 1360-3108 print/ISSN 1460-7018 online # 2012 Taylor & Francis http://www.tandfonline.com http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13603108.2012.679752
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while continental Europe lags behind. The report ‘International Branch Campuses: Data and Developments’ of the Observatory on Borderless Higher Education (2012) observes a gradual increase in the number of branch campuses, with the USA at the forefront with seventy-eight out of 200, followed by the UK (twenty-five) and Australia (twelve). In continental Europe, France in particular and Germany secondly are new players, but overall the presence of continental Europe remains marginal. The market is shifting from the Middle East to Asia. Notably, the number of students in offshore activities for both the UK and Australia is increasing more rapidly than onshore. The slowdown in onshore numbers is perhaps not unexpected, given the ‘maturity’ of that market. Still, the offshore enrolment expansions represent a notable trend worth watching in the overall evolution of international student mobility and enrolment patterns.
… the USA a nd Europe, and English-speaking d e s t i n a t i ons i n gener al , remain the dominant a ctors in international s tudent mobility, notwithstanding the i ncreasing competition f rom th e res t of th e worl d … Overall, the USA and Europe, and English-speaking destinations in general, remain the dominant actors in international student mobility, notwithstanding the increasing competition from the rest of the world. What are the trends in international student mobility in the USA and Europe? And what are the challenges they face at present and in the near future?
Student mobility in the USA: a powerhouse under challenge As the world’s most popular destination country for international students (OECD 2010), the USA has been a powerhouse player in the context of global student mobility for decades. The ability of the American higher education system to attract high-quality, degree-seeking post graduate students from abroad has been especially notable, particularly in the highly competitive STEM fields and other innovative areas. Conversely, US students have long been remarkably ‘immobile’. Participation rates in short-term ‘study abroad’ (largely of the credit-bearing variety) have traditionally beenminuscule – and tending increasingly towards sojourns of very short duration –
while the pursuit by Americans of full degrees outside the country has been considered a statistical anomaly in the contemporary era. Important changes are occurring, however, in terms of both the inbound and outbound flows of students. There are notable quantitative and qualitative dimensions to these developments. Of fundamental importance is the rising sense in the USA of stronger competition globally for sheer numbers of international students, higher stakes in the worldwide race to attract and retain top academic talent, and the intrinsic importance of educating American students for more extensive and more effective global engagement over the course of their productive lives. On the inbound side, US ‘dominance’ of the global international student market appears to be slipping, with the USA hosting a declining share of the world’s mobile students over the last decade, from 23% to 18% in the latest OECD statistics (OECD 2011: 321). Still, although international students have always represented a very small percentage of the total student cohort in US higher education, the USA continues to enjoy a competitive profile globally, as evidenced by its sizable international student population of some 690,000 (IIE 2010d). Although after 11 September 2001, one could see a slight decline in incoming mobility, also due to security measures taken, the USA made a recently fast recovery. However, Europe collectively captures more students from around the world (OECD 2011: 321), and American higher education leaders and policy-makers are increasingly aware that the ability to attract international students is likely to require more focused efforts to promote the USA as a destination of choice. Political and economic arguments dominate much of the discourse on the subject, although the merits of academic quality through diversity also come into play. Citing these and other rationales, individual institutions continue to implement their own international recruitment efforts, exploring a variety of options to raise their profiles and engage with potential students. Interestingly, a heated debate in the USA about the use of recruitment agents has recently raised key questions about the intersection between efficiency and ethics in this work (Fischer 2011). Beyond the efforts of single institutions, there is also a growing tendency for collective action, which is unique in the highly decentralised context of the USA. Perhaps the most ‘official’ of US efforts is embodied by EducationUSA, a network of more than 400 advising centres around the world supported by the US Department of State (EducationUSA n.d.). While serving ‘millions’ annually, EducationUSA has not appeared to generate much in the way of high-profile excitement for ‘destination USA’. But the country does seem to be quite serious about engaging internationally, both for student recruitment and more extensive partnership projects. This is particularly true with regard to specific
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countries of interest such as India and China. In 2009 – 10, 15.2% of the international students in the USA (a total of 104,897) were Indian – second only to the 18.5% (or 127,628) from China (IIE 2010g). Perhaps even more notable, Indian and Chinese students represented by far the largest nationalities of foreign students enrolled at graduate level in the USA, totalling 68,290, and 66,453, respectively, in 2009 – 10 (IIE 2010c). There is much for the USA to gain – and retain – by way of strategic relationships with such massive student feeder countries. In terms of outgoing student mobility the number of degree-seeking students from the USA abroad is extremely low. As far as mobility understood as short-term, credit-seeking experiences is concerned, the USA enjoyed dynamic growth in numbers for a quarter of a century until 2008 – 09 (the latest year for which data are available). Participation in study abroad rose nearly 82% over the period 1999 – 2000 to 2008 – 09. However, in 2008 – 09, these figures registered a slight decline of 0.8% from the previous year, down to 260,327 from 262,416 (IIE 2010g). Despite the overall slide in numbers, enhanced interest in non-traditional (ie, non-European) destinations was particularly notable in 2008 – 09 (IIE 2010f). Still, in that year just 1.4% of the country’s approximately nineteen million higher education students spent time abroad, and the bulk of these individuals were white (80.5%) undergraduates (nearly 89%) (IIE 2010e) who largely went to Europe (54.5%) (IIE 2010b). Moreover, just 4% of all US students abroad in 2008 – 09 were away for an entire academic year; the vast majority undertook only short-term study abroad (see Table 1). Although much less common than the classic American short-term study abroad experience, OECD data from 2008 suggest that American students seeking longer-term experiences – and even full degrees – outside the USA can be found in sizable numbers in the UK (13,895), Canada (8,310), and Australia (3,055), among other (mostly Western European) countries (OECD n.d.). Through a variety of channels, the USA has committed itself publicly in recent years to increasing and diversifying the post-secondary population studying abroad (in the context of credit mobility only), and the destinations chosen by these students. The
Duration Full academic year One semester Summer term 8 weeks or less during academic year
Percentage of students 4.1 37.5 35.8 11.7
Table 1. Duration of U.S. study abroad experiences, 2008–09. Source: IIE (2010a).
suggestions put forward by the Commission on the Abraham Lincoln Study Abroad Fellowship Program (2005) – calling for one million US students to be sent abroad annually, by 2016 – 17 – represented a watershed moment in this national discussion, although unfortunately this effort has not yet yielded the hopedfor results in terms of legislation, funding, organisation, or growth in study abroad numbers. The 2009 announcement by President Barack Obama of the ‘100,000 Strong Initiative’ is a more targeted but in many ways no less ambitious goal ‘to increase dramatically the number and diversify the composition of American students studying in China’ (US Department of State, n.d.: n.p.). Scholarships for various categories of ‘under-represented’ students (whether by virtue of socioeconomic status, academic major, or institutional type) provide other examples of the way in which attention is being placed on broadening and deepening participation in US study abroad. Mobility remains a bedrock of US internationalisation activities, and internationalisation is an area of on-going (and, arguably, rising) interest in the USA. Indeed, in October 2010 the American Council on Education (ACE) convened a ‘Blue Ribbon Panel on Global Engagement’, citing specifically the drop in the USA’s share of the globally mobile student population as one of a multitude of pressing concerns facing the country’s higher education leadership as it endeavours ‘to both navigate and influence the new global environment’ (ACE 2010 n.p.). Both expanding and enhancing the inbound and outbound student populations are emerging as important issues for the USA in the current context. There appears to be real momentum, at least in terms of intent. However, finding the vision and the resources to achieve real results is proving challenging, while the profound and ongoing economic crisis in the USA and around the world is both complicating the outlooks and raising the stakes for success in this area.
Europe: can it maintain its dominant position? In the 1960s and 1970s, the international dimension of European higher education was still marginal. The landscape was dominated primarily by the movement of students from developing countries – mainly former colonies – to Europe and by some outward circulation of students and scholars from Europe to the USA. There was also a concentration on development aid through higher education mechanisms during this period. In the 1980s however, two different shifts occurred in Western Europe. The ‘benevolent laissezfaire’ policy (Baron 1993: 50) and the ‘humanitarianism and internationalism’ (Chandler 1989: viii) that characterised the previous decades did not completely disappear, but these approaches were bypassed by new policies. In continental Europe, first a movement took place towards the more systematic and planned reception
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of degree-seeking students from abroad, followed by more extensive intra-European cooperation and exchange in the form of student and staff mobility. In parallel, and different from the rest of the continent, the UK began to actively recruit fee-paying (degree-seeking) international students.
… The discussion about international student flows in Europe is closely linked to, and Downloaded by [University of Western Sydney Ward] at 21:17 15 January 2013
influenced by, the developments and differences that exist between European countries with regard to tuition fees … The discussion about international student flows in Europe is closely linked to, and influenced by, the developments and differences that exist between European countries with regard to tuition fees. The 1979 decision by the British government to introduce full-cost fees for foreign full-degree students (a move from ‘aid-to-trade’) clearly distinguished this country from the rest of Europe and immediately resulted in a more competitive higher education subsector in the UK. In contrast, in continental Europe the introduction of full-cost fees, and the attendant treatment of higher education as an export commodity, remained anathema for more than two decades. From the mid-1980s onwards, ‘enhanced cooperation’ is the phrase that best describes the higher education situation on the continent, notably under the impetus of EU programmes, and in particular thanks to the 1987 launch of the European Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students (ERASMUS). The driving rationales behind these initiatives were both Europeanisation – ostensibly to contribute to European integration under the framework of the European Communities (that were soon to become the European Union) – as well as strengthening Europe’s position in the global economy. Clearly, what characterised the European higher education landscape in this period was diversity, despite several areas of joint action. By the beginning of the new millennium, some of the differences related to tuition practices that had existed between the UK and such places as The Netherlands, some Scandinavian countries, Germany and France, began to fade. Yet, while several European countries – including Denmark, The Netherlands, Sweden, and Finland – have introduced or will soon introduce full-cost fees for non-EU/EEA students, the rationale behind this trend is very different from that
of the UK. The main drive in these four countries has not been income-generation but rather the attempt to ease the financial burden on domestic taxpayers and to ultimately ‘attract’ better-quality students from abroad. Keeping in mind these various developments across Europe during the past several decades, the trends in international student flows to and from Europe prove all the more interesting. Although it hosts less than a tenth of the world’s total population, Europe is and has been doing remarkably well in attracting degree-seeking foreign students. Over the last ten years, it has in fact been the most popular continent for study abroad, receiving more than half of all students who studied towards a degree outside their country of origin. (In this section, ‘study abroad’ is used to refer to full-degree studies abroad, in contrast to the American standard use of this term, that generally refers to ‘short-term mobility’ abroad (ie to credit mobility). Unlike other major study destinations, such as the USA – whose ‘market share’ has continuously dropped after 2001 – Europe has managed to preserve its position on the global education market, despite growing competition from non-traditional study destinations like China, India or Japan. In 2006–07, 1.5 million foreign full-degree students studied in thirty-two European countries – an alltime high, corresponding to 6.9% of all students enrolled in this region of the world and 50.9% of the total number of foreign students worldwide (Teichler et al 2011). The number of foreign students in Europe has unquestionably gone through a marked increase from 1998–99 levels, when the number of foreign nationality students enrolled in Europe stood at only 827,000. Equally interesting, the number of foreign students in Europe increased at a much faster pace than the total number of students pursuing higher education studies in this region – which could point to Europe’s increased attractiveness as a study destination (Teichler et al 2011).
… t wo-thirds of a ll foreign students i n Europe are concentrated in just three count ries, namely t he U K , Germany and France … Yet this impressive macro-level picture tells only one part of the story. For example, two-thirds of all foreign students in Europe are concentrated in just three countries, namely the UK, Germany and France, which means that the European mobility average is strongly influenced by mobility developments in these three countries. Furthermore, the European average says little about student mobility at the level of individual European countries (see table 2). In absolute as well
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Percentage of the total student population
Europe 32 host countries
Absolute numbers
AT Austria BE Belgium BG Bulgaria CH Switzerland CY Cyprus CZ Czech Republic DE Germany DK Denmark EE Estonia ES Spain FI Finland FR France GR Greece HU Hungary IE Ireland IS Iceland IT Italy LI Liechtenstein LT Lithuania LU Luxembourg LV Latvia MT Malta NL The Netherlands NO Norway PL Poland PT Portugal RO Romania SE Sweden SI Slovenia SK Slovakia TR Turkey UK United Kingdom TOTAL
43,572 47,218 9,351 41,058 5,973 24,483
16.7 12.0 3.6 19.3 26.9 6.8
258,513 20,851 2,200 59,814 10,066 246,612 21,160 15,110 16,758 783 57,271 594 1,920 – 1,433 607 37,815
11.3 9.0 3.2 3.4 3.3 11.3 3.5 3.5 8.8 4.9 2.8 88.3 1.0 n.a. 1.1 6.2 6.4
15,618 13,021 17,950 12,188 42,769 1,511 2,010 19,257 459,987
7.3 0.6 4.9 1.3 10.3 1.3 0.9 0.8 19.5
1,507,473
6.9
Table 2. Foreign students in individual European countries, 2006–07. Source: UOE 2010.
as in relative terms, ‘variety’ is the word that best describes the status quo at the national level. Indeed, the total number of foreign students ranges from close to 460,000 in the UK to just 607 in Malta, while foreign students as a share of total enrolment spans from 26.9% in Cyprus to 0.6% in Poland. The regions and countries of origin of foreign students in Europe present an even more nuanced picture. The foreign degree-seeking student body in Europe is comprised both of nationals of European countries that study in a European country other than their country of origin (intra-European mobility), as well as students coming from outside Europe. In 2006–07, non-Europeans accounted for 49.9% of the foreign student body in Europe, while intra-European degree mobility accounted for 46.7% (rest unknown). Over time, the number of non-
Europeans studying towards a degree in Europe has increased much faster than the number of European students enrolled in European countries other than their country of origin. It grew from 365,000 in 1998–99 to 745,000 in 2006–07. Chinese students are the largest national group of foreign students in Europe – 123,000 in 2006–07. They accounted for 8.2% of total foreign student enrolment in Europe in this year, followed at some distance by Germans (75,000), French (53,000), Italians (41,000) and Poles (39,000). In contrast, 673,000 European students in 2006–07 studied towards a degree outside their country of nationality, making Europe a net importer region of foreign students, or, to put it differently, a net exporter of higher education (Teichler et al 2011). The study abroad ratio of Europeans in 2006–07 was 0.033, meaning that for every 1,000 European students enrolled in Europe there were thirty-three Europeans enrolled abroad. Enrolment abroad also grew during the last decade (by 37%), though at a slower pace than foreign enrolment in Europe (which grew by 82%). But, as in the case of foreign enrolment, stark differences exist between European countries (Table 3). Countries with very high study abroad ratios are Iceland (0.251), Malta (0.117), and Cyprus (1.380), ie countries with limited higher education capacity ‘at home’. At the other end of the spectrum, the UK has a study abroad ratio of just 0.012. In other words, for every 1,000 British students in the UK, as few as twelve UK students are enrolled abroad. The linguistic factor is often blamed in the literature as main the cause of this UK handicap—foreign languages have been non-compulsory in the UK at the level of the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) since 2004. Table 3 provides a comprehensive snapshot of data relevant to this issue. Looking at favourite destinations of European students, there is a clear preference for other European countries. Indeed, 85.5% of European nationals who studied towards a degree abroad in 2006–07 stayed within Europe – an increase from 82.2% in 1998–99 (Teichler et al 2011). While the USA and Australia remain important destination countries for European students, their appeal seems to be waning. The UK and Germany are clearly the preferred destinations of European students who study abroad in pursuit of full degrees. While the body of knowledge and data covering degree studies abroad is richer now than ten years ago, further advances should be achieved in international data collection in order to capture genuine cross-border mobility for studies rather than simply nationality information about students. And while most data-collection activity focuses mainly on diploma mobility, fairly little is known at the international level about the full extent of international credit (temporary/short-term) mobility, which occurs in the course of ongoing studies. At the European level only the ERASMUS Programme sheds some light in this direction; in addition to the figures presented above, about 200,000 European students are mobile every year through ERASMUS, ie just below 1% of all students in
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Country of nationality of study abroad students AT Austria BE Belgium BG Bulgaria CH Switzerland CY Cyprus CZ Czech Republic DE Germany DK Denmark EE Estonia ES Spain FI Finland FR France GR Greece HU Hungary IE Ireland IS Iceland IT Italy LI Liechtenstein LT Lithuania LU Luxembourg LV Latvia MT Malta NL The Netherlands NO Norway PL Poland PT Portugal RO Romania SE Sweden SI Slovenia SK Slovakia TR Turkey UK United Kingdom TOTAL
… M uch more than in other
Absolute numbers
Ratio of students enrolled abroad to nationals enrolled at home
12,965 10,355 26,623 9,850 22,411 8,419 87,750 6,838 4,020 29,027 9,838 61,593 38,231 8,551 30,204 3,771 45,044 747 8,532 7,148 4,680 1,074 14,433 13,646 41,896 16,639 24,597 15,791 2,699 25,466 56,555 23,393 672,786
0.060 0.030 0.107 0.057 1.379 0.025 0.043 0.032 0.060 0.017 0.033 0.032 0.066 0.021 0.174 0.251 0.023 9.456 0.043 n.a. 0.037 0.117 0.026 0.068 0.020 0.048 0.027 0.043 0.024 0.118 0.023 0.012 0.033
mobility has been promoted
Table 3. European study abroad (degreeseeking) students, 2006–07. Source: UOE 2010.
Europe. ERASMUS, of course, accounts for only part of all European credit mobility that takes place every year. This impressive growth in numbers over the past decade was mirrored by an unprecedented level of attention paid to student mobility in national and European-level policy circles. Much more than in other parts of the world, student mobility has been promoted in Europe as an intrinsically positive and desirable development, and has become at many levels a policy goal in itself. The extent to which the existence of mobility policies and targets has been instrumental for the recent mobility trends is yet to be established. What is apparent, though, is that significant growth has been achieved both in countries with clearlyarticulated mobility (internationalisation) policies like the UK, Germany, or the Nordic countries, and in countries which still lack such strategic approaches.
parts of t he world, student in Europe as an intrinsically positive a nd desirable development, and h as become at many levels a policy goal i n i tself … While the numbers are still important, it is also notable that many European countries are moving to more qualitative reflections about mobility. This interest is manifested in many forms. Some countries undertake measures to ensure that not only ‘more’ but also ‘the best’ students from abroad access their higher education systems. Others are designing measures to guarantee that the mobility period abroad or at home is of ‘good quality’, while others have become particularly interested in exploring the question ‘Why mobility?’ and in researching the academic, personal or professional impact of international mobility experiences. At the same time, worries about some ‘unintended consequences’ of international student mobility are starting to be voiced. Discussions about imbalances in mobility flows are increasingly being raised by countries which find themselves in an unfair position, displaying either higher outflows than inflows, or the opposite. Austria for example, and also the French-speaking community of Belgium, have been particularly worried about the large inflow of foreign students from two neighbouring countries—Germany and France, respectively—into their medical and paramedical study programmes. These countries have argued that this situation has posed severe limitations on the access opportunities of their own nationals to these highly critical fields of study. To counteract this trend, the two countries have imposed a quota system on foreign students, a decision largely criticised in Europe and currently scrutinised by the European Court of Justice. Recently, The Netherlands has also become concerned about the costs of the large inflow of German students into the country, in particular at the border institutions of higher education.
Concluding remarks The international student mobility scenarios presented by the USA and Europe are complex, nuanced and (while perhaps not exactly subject to sudden and dramatic change) potentially quite fluid. On the one hand, both Europe and the USA occupy positions of
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privilege with regard to their ability to attract large numbers of qualified international students, shored up by both capacity and long-standing prestige. By and large, higher education leaders and policy-makers in both parts of the world seem to take seriously the call to competitive action when it comes to attracting international talent and encouraging domestic students to explore learning opportunities abroad. Still, it is likely to be foolhardy to expect that the anticipated increases in international student circulation in the coming decades will continue to benefit these two powerhouses in much the same way as in past decades. In contrast with the past, there are today far too many variables, notably beyond the control of individual institutions, countries or regions, which may affect the global student mobility trends of the next several years. National visa regulations, antiimmigration policies, rising tuition fees, a lack of quality control among private providers and a shift from quantity to quality by the top research universities are local factors that may lead to decreasing numbers. External factors that may squeeze supply include increased international competition by countries – such as Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and mainland China – which have in recent decades sent large numbers of students abroad. There is also much more widespread (and increasingly high-quality) domestic and foreign provision of higher education in these countries, which will have a bearing on whether or not students from these countries will be inclined to study abroad at all. For the world’s international student powerhouses, the impact of many of these external factors is likely to be minimal in the short term, as there is still high unmet demand for access to (quality) post-secondary education in many emerging economies. Furthermore, increased domestic capacity for higher education provision is likely to more readily affect mobility trends at the bachelor’s level, followed later by shifts at the master’s and doctoral levels. Barring major internal developments with strong negative effects on international student interest in the USA or Europe, their powerhouse positions may be safe for now. This may even be true in scenarios where other countries rapidly expand their capacity to attract and absorb internationally mobile students, given the fast pace of growth in the sector. More critical will be
the extent to which Europe and the USA can, over the longer term, prove sufficiently insightful to anticipate – and nimble enough to adapt to – changing international student preferences and enrolment patterns, and to manage their many unintended outcomes.
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