The Australian Learning Abroad sector, the global shining beacon of 2019, is a key pillar of the international education sector. Its reshaping will support the Australian Universities Accord international agenda.
CISaustralia has released version 6.0 of its Learning Abroad insights. The survey series dates back to April 2020, tracking the pulse of learning abroad and the impact of COVID-19 across Australian universities.
It shows Australia well well-positioned to rebound.
Versions 2.0 (Nov 2020), 3.0 (May 2021), 4.0 (Nov 2021), 5.0 (July 2022), and now 6.0 (July 2023) build a comprehensive data set. The cumulative results enable an analysis of what changed during COVID-19 and an opportunity to benchmark university positions.
The indicators developed by CISaustralia gave universities the opportunity to provide anonymous responses. The analysis of deidentified data is delivered in a format to assist future planning and decision-making across the sector.
The Jul 2023 survey (6.0), sent to 40 Australian universities, was completed by learning abroad staff and drew 37 responses (92.5% of the survey cohort). With prospective and current students often suffering from survey fatigue, this view through the staff lens is a valuable addition to other institutional market insights.
An overarching observation
The headline is Australia is doing well, according to Brad Dorahy, Founder and CEO of CISaustralia. “Australia continues to rebound successfully post-COVID, despite headwinds associated with staff layoffs, restructures and change management processes that have occurred in the last 3-4 years.”
“While 9 Australian universities (25%) are planning to send 1,000+ students abroad in 2024 and 3 institutions plan to send 4,000+ students abroad in 2024, 23 universities (67%) will be at 50% or better recovery post COVID,” he says.
Residual limiting factors?
According to Dorahy, the number one factor limiting institutional Learning Abroad enrolments in 2023 was “limited interest, engagement and availability of Academic staff.”
With the survey showing staff expect study tours to be the most popular type of programming in 2024 and academic credit more often than not a hurdle requirement for funding, buy-in from the academic community is critical to a program rebuild.
Delivering academic credit, building university programming that embeds learning abroad into the curriculum and constructing degree pathways conducive to learning abroad are key functions of a partnership for learning abroad offices with Faculty Academic Boards.
Is there growth on the horizon?
In short, Yes.
With 17 universities (50%) having employed new learning abroad staff in the last 6 months, “the good news is that 23 universities (62%) are planning to employ more staff in the learning abroad area in the next 12 months – a strong recovery indicator.” He says.
Other survey highlights
- 33 of surveyed universities (90%) expect at least 75% of their 2024 learning abroad cohort to seek academic credit.
- Europe appears as the most popular destination of choice, followed by Asia, then North America. Africa and South America remain the least sought-after destinations.
- In 2024, Japan may be the most popular New Colombo Plan funded destination across the Indo-Pacific.
- Close to 50% of institutional respondents feel OS-HELP has lost pace with inflation and 75% believe NCP funding has lost pace with inflation.
With 25 universities (65%) using third-party providers to send 10% or more of their cohort abroad in 2023, this group of partner organisations will play a critical role in the delivery of learning abroad and the scale-up of capability and capacity for universities. Clear value propositions from providers and engagement with procurement offices will be important to scale these opportunities.
Staff identified virtual programs as potentially one of the least popular forms of learning abroad programming 65% of Australian institutions appear to be prioritising future funding for overseas travel, in contrast to 30% for virtual programs.
So, with the sector set for an exciting path ahead, these insights from the CISaustralia survey, coupled with other market intelligence, can inform the design and delivery of future programs.
More information on this survey and the series can be found here.
Thank you: To Brad Dorhay for data access and CISaustralia for their investment in, delivery of and provision of the national survey.
