International Student Enrolments Up 19.9% in September 2008
Wednesday, 29 October 2008
The year-to-date (YTD) September 2008 AEI International Student Data show there were 494,507 enrolments by full-fee paying international students in Australia on a student visa. This is a 19.9% increase on YTD September 2007. Commencements in the same period grew by 23.9%.
Nationality
Enrolments
The main source of Australia’s international students is the Asian region. Four of every five (79.0%) international student enrolments at onshore educational institutions were from the Asian region.
Nine of the top ten countries recorded increases in enrolments between YTD September 2007 and YTD September 2008. India recorded the largest increase with 28,838 more enrolments than the corresponding period in 2007, a 51.3% growth. Other top ten markets that grew strongly were China (growth of 19.4%), Nepal (110.1%), Vietnam (63.5%) and Brazil (29.3%).
Outside the top ten, countries with strong growth include Saudi Arabia (113.5%), Colombia (44.3%), Mauritius (64.6%), Sri Lanka (23.6%), Pakistan (31.5%) and the Philippines (42.2%).
Enrolments from Japan and Hong Kong declined in all sectors, with overall declines of 15.3% and 5.1% respectively. The decline in enrolments from Japan has seen this market remain outside the top 10 enrolment markets as at YTD September 2008. The decline in the Japan market has mainly been in the ELICOS sector with smaller declines in the vocational education and training (VET) and higher education sectors.
Other significant markets such as the United States of America (USA), Bangladesh and Taiwan continued to record falls in enrolments.
International student enrolments by nationality (top 10 markets),
YTD September 2008
|
Nationality |
Enrolments |
% of Total |
Growth on YTD September 2007 |
|
China |
115,597 |
23.4% |
19.4% |
|
India |
85,026 |
17.2% |
51.3% |
|
Republic of Korea |
32,859 |
6.6% |
4.0% |
|
Malaysia |
20,660 |
4.2% |
6.8% |
|
Thailand |
19,560 |
4.0% |
11.4% |
|
Hong Kong |
17,108 |
3.5% |
-5.1% |
|
Nepal |
15,766 |
3.2% |
110.1% |
|
Indonesia |
14,506 |
2.9% |
5.3% |
|
Vietnam |
13,843 |
2.8% |
63.5% |
|
Brazil |
13,715 |
2.8% |
29.3% |
|
Other Nationalities |
145,867 |
29.5% |
10.1% |
|
Total Enrolments |
494,507 |
100.0% |
19.9% |
Commencements
Overall commencements grew by 23.9% between YTD September 2007 and YTD September 2008. India recorded the greatest growth with 16,247 more commencements than the corresponding period in 2007 (a growth of 50.8%). China recorded 13,327 more commencements (27.3% growth) in the same period. Should this pattern continue it is expected that commencements from India will exceed those from China within the next 12 months.
Commencements growth from India was primarily in the VET and ELICOS sectors (73.7% and 71.7% respectively), although there was 5.3% growth in higher education. By comparison, most of the growth in Chinese commencements was distributed across the VET (44.5%), higher education (20.5%) and ELICOS (23.3%) sectors.
Other top ten markets showing double digit growth in commencements as at YTD September 2008 include Thailand (14.7%), Nepal (72.8%), Brazil (32.7%), Malaysia (13.0%) and Vietnam (79.9%). Among the other top 10 nationalities, the Republic of Korea recorded just 4.4% growth, and the USA and Hong Kong recorded declines in commencements of 2.0% and 1.9% respectively. Outside the top 10, markets showing strong growth in commencements include Saudi Arabia (113.6%), Mauritius (104.0%), Colombia (36.0%) and Indonesia (16.9%).
International student commencements by nationality (top 10 markets),
YTD September 2008
|
Nationality |
Commencements |
% of Total |
Growth on YTD September 2007 |
|
China |
62,169 |
22.6% |
27.3% |
|
India |
48,226 |
17.6% |
50.8% |
|
Republic of Korea |
18,312 |
6.7% |
4.4% |
|
Thailand |
10,928 |
4.0% |
14.7% |
|
Nepal |
9,689 |
3.5% |
72.8% |
|
Brazil |
9,633 |
3.5% |
32.7% |
|
USA |
9,340 |
3.4% |
-2.0% |
|
Malaysia |
9,149 |
3.3% |
13.0% |
|
Vietnam |
8,496 |
3.1% |
79.9% |
|
Hong Kong |
7,090 |
2.6% |
-1.9% |
|
Other Nationalities |
81,741 |
29.7% |
14.5% |
|
Total Commencements |
274,773 |
100.0% |
23.9% |
Sector
Higher Education
In YTD September 2008, the highest proportion of international student enrolments were in the higher education sector (36.4%). Enrolments in this sector increased by 4.5% while commencements increased 11.4% compared with the corresponding period in 2007.
China, India and Malaysia were the three largest contributing nationalities in both enrolments and commencements. China recorded the largest increase in commencements with 3,768 more commencements than the corresponding period in 2007, equivalent to a growth rate of 20.5%. Other markets contributing to the growth in commencements were Vietnam (59.6%), India (5.3%), Malaysia (9.2%), Saudi Arabia (78.8%), and the Republic of Korea (14.5%).
The majority of the commencements growth in this sector occurred in the ‘Management and Commerce’ broad field of education, which increased 14.6% on last year. ‘Society and Culture’, ‘Information Technology’ and ‘Engineering and Related Technologies’ also grew strongly, with increases of 8.7%, 7.4% and 9.4% respectively.
At the detailed level, much of the rise in the higher education sector occurred in ‘Management and Commerce’, ‘Business and Management’ and ‘Banking and Finance’ courses.
International Student Enrolments and Commencements by Sector,
YTD September 2008
|
Enrolments |
Commencements |
||||||
|
Sector |
Number |
% of Total |
Growth on YTD September 2007 |
Number |
% of Total |
Growth on YTD September 2007 |
|
|
Higher Education |
179,903 |
36.4% |
4.5% |
75,155 |
27.4% |
11.4% |
|
|
VET |
155,927 |
31.5% |
46.9% |
86,754 |
31.6% |
46.9% |
|
|
Schools |
27,653 |
5.6% |
9.1% |
13,254 |
4.8% |
9.6% |
|
|
ELICOS |
101,865 |
20.6% |
23.8% |
75,469 |
27.5% |
23.1% |
|
|
Other |
29,159 |
5.9% |
10.7% |
24,141 |
8.8% |
10.8% |
|
|
Total |
494,507 |
100.0% |
19.9% |
274,773 |
100.0% |
23.9% |
|
Vocational Education and Training (VET)
As at YTD September 2008, the proportion of international student enrolments in the VET sector was 31.5%, an increase from the 25.7% recorded in YTD September 2007.
The sector has experienced a sustained period of strong growth since 2005 and this is continuing in 2008. YTD September 2008 figures show increases of 46.9% in both enrolments and commencements over the same period in 2007. VET commencements continue to exceed those for higher education. The three largest markets in this sector, in bo
th enrolments and commencements, are India, China and Nepal. Together they account for 71.2% and 67.2% of the increase in enrolments and commencements respectively. Other markets to record significant growth in enrolments were Republic of Korea (23.1%), Thailand (25.1%), Vietnam (95.8%) and Mauritius (93.4%).
The top four broad fields of education in both enrolments and commencements were ‘Management and Commerce’, ‘Food, Hospitality and Personal Services’, ‘Society and Culture’ and ‘Engineering and Related Technologies’. ‘Management and Commerce’ recorded the largest increase in commencements with 11,906 more commencements than the corresponding period in 2007, representing growth of 37.3%. The top detailed field of education was ‘Hospitality Management’, with 19,628 commencements and growth of 35.2%. Other detailed fields of education contributing to the overall growth in VET commencements include ‘Business Management’ (80.7% growth), ‘Hospitality’ (436.7%) and ‘Welfare Studies’ (158.1%).
ELICOS
Enrolments and commencements in the ELICOS sector grew 23.8% and 23.1% respectively between YTD September 2007 and YTD September 2008, continuing the strong growth seen in the sector since 2006. Strong growth markets in enrolments include India (75.2%), China (26.5% growth), Vietnam (117.5%) and Saudi Arabia (118.4%). There were continuing declines from established markets in the sector such as Japan (-19.6%) and Taiwan (-12.1%). The Republic of Korea and Bangladesh, both growing markets in YTD September 2007, showed declines of -6.2% and -49.2% respectively for YTD September 2008.
Schools
Enrolments and commencements in the schools sector grew by 9.1% and 9.6% respectively. The growth in enrolments continues the upwards trend set through 2007. Enrolments from China now make up 46.6% of all international student enrolments in this sector. YTD September 2008 figures for China showed increases of 27.4% and 28.5% in enrolments and commencements respectively over the same period in 2007.
China has a strong influence on the schools sector. If China were excluded from the data, the sector would show an overall decline of 3.1% and 3.5% in enrolments and commencements respectively.
Large schools markets in decline include the Republic of Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand and Indonesia. These markets together currently account for 30.1% of schools sector enrolments.
About this data set
AEI enrolment data are extracted from the PRISMS database which is updated continually by education providers and by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship. Consequently, when AEI makes a new release it also updates its data for previous months in the current year to reflect these changes. Data on enrolments and commencements relate only to international students in Australia on a student visa. An enrolment is a count of any student enrolments in a discrete course of study and includes ongoing students. A commencement is a count of new student enrolments in a discrete course of study (and hence a component of the total count of all enrolments).
Note that AEI introduced the Australian Standard Classification of Education (ASCED) into the International Student Data series in the year-to-date (YTD) January 2008 data. The Classification defines ‘Field of Education’ as being the subject matter of an educational activity. The introduction of ASCED provides a finer level of detail about the course of study undertaken by international students than with the old ‘Broad field of study’ classification. The older classification will be phased out after the YTD December 2008 data release.
The latest 2008 data can be viewed at: http://aei.gov.au/AEI/MIP/Statistics/StudentEnrolmentAndVisaStatistics/2008/Default.htm
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