This week's top #socialmedia and #intled news includes webinars on how to diversify international markets, manage agents, and understanding student audiences, as well as 90K US student visas issued in three months to Indian students, an aggregator's blocklist, and fallout from student housing crises.
- Are you doing campaigns with your student ambassadors to help diversify your international markets? This upcoming TAP webinar on Wednesday promises to give away some useful ideas to that end.
- While the topic of this Chronicle webinar sounds appealing from an institutional perspective, I hope the conversation turns to the need for agency relationships to be true partnerships. That’s where the real growth happens.
- Over the last three months, the team at Intead has produced some exceptional blog content for university reps to digest, ponder, and implement essential changes in their approach to the challenges of our field. Here’s a good summary.
- Make sure you read the title of this ICEF podcast. The fact that Asian nations are increasingly becoming DESTINATIONS for international students is the kind of perspective all of us in the West need to understand.
- We all want to increase our colleges’ brand awareness with international students. This BridgeU guide offers six strategies to make that happen with the right students at the right time.
- This Webcertain livestream on Tuesday offers solutions to: “What does understanding your audience really mean? Where do you start? What should you prioritise? How different will your target audience look across markets?”
- TikTok’s plans for world domination, at least in terms of ad revenue and TikTokShop, are taking a hit in Indonesia, where the government has banned e-commerce transactions on social media platforms. Oops.
International Education News
- The data is very compelling. Since 1996, California colleges have been unable to use race in admissions. This fall, 2023, the UC system admitted the largest number of underrepresented minority students ever. It can be done!
- US consular officers in India worked overtime this summer. A record 90,000 student visas were issued in June, July, and August. All of last year, 2022, a record 125K student visas went to Indian students. Onward and upward!
- Altogether, one million Indians applied for various US visas this year (so far). That amount represents a 20% increase over pre-pandemic levels. What was that about Indian student flows slowing to Western destinations?
- This University World News piece shares the intriguing proposition that international higher education plays an important role in the continued disintegration of the old Soviet empire and Russian attempts to revitalize it.
- Why ApplyBoard called its new blacklist of agents prohibited from using its platform a blocklist is funny enough, but this could get quite interesting as they include a nomination form to have other suspect agents added to the list. Get the popcorn.
- This article on the importance of post-admit conversion for international students sheds significant light on the challenges of meeting students where they are. If you don’t know where they are applying, what’s influencing their decision, what do you do? Ask! Are you conducting surveys with admitted students?
- While the Dept of Ed’s new gainful employment rules aren’t meant for international students, the central question of “Is this a worthwhile investment?” is front and center for parents of prospective international undergraduates. Are you listening?
- Israeli citizens who wish to visit the US no longer have to apply for a visitor visa. They are now included in the Visa Waiver Program, as is much of Europe. Now, if we could only do similar things for the student visa category.
- Australia - Did you know that 90% of the housing for international students in Australia is available off-campus, but rental prices have increased 10-20% for those rental apartments in major cities? Something’s gotta give.
- Canada - What does Canada’s new two-tiered Trusted Institutional Framework mean for the private vocational colleges and some lesser universities that have found themselves in various spots of bother? Shape up or lose students to delayed visa processing.
- Canada - Glad to see this article rising to the defense of international students in Canada. Overseas students have been made a convenient scape goat to cover for the lack of planning by institutions and municipalities for their larger communities.
- Canada - These scams targeting international students in Canada are a disgrace (as they are everywhere), but odd that the affected institutions haven’t taken any public steps to protect their overseas students.
- Canada - While the diplomatic spat between India and Canada has led to India barring entry for Canadians, fortunately the Canadian government has wisely, so far, kept their own counsel and not reciprocated. That decision would have seismic consequences.
- China - Is this decision by Xi’an Jiaotong University to remove English proficiency requirements an outlier or a worrying sign of further retrenchment by higher education institutions in China from the West? Let’s hope it’s the latter but can’t ignore facts.
- France - Former colony’s relationships tend to be quite messy. France has now banned new students from Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso from studying there due to security concerns of recent military coups in each of those nations.
- India - What do all these countries (Bangladesh, the UAE, China, Georgia, Germany, Ireland, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, New Zealand, Oman, Philippines, Russia, and Saudi Arabia) have in common? Each hosts more than 5K Indian students.
- New Zealand - Well, for those hoping for a renewed Kiwi push to internationalize their colleges and universities, the National Party in New Zealand is all in on expanding its international student enrollments, even to expand work benefits.
- Nigeria - Could this slow-rolling and/or outright refusal of visas to UK uni reps be a bit of tit-for-tat by the Nigerian government in response to the looming dependent ban Nigerian students are facing come January 1st?
- United Kingdom - The UK government is not giving up on China, much to the relief of its unis: “Now is not the time to turn away from China engagement, despite the geopolitical challenges and volatile rhetoric.”
If you’d like a more in-depth analysis of the leading news stories each week, check out our?#MidweekRoundup?#intled?#livechat?on Wednesday at 1 p.m. ET on the SMIE Consulting?Facebook?page,?YouTube?channel,?Twitter feed, and?LinkedIn. A podcast version is available as well on all major podcast provider platforms.
