Little obstacles add up

It’s easy for potential overseas students to become disenchanted with the Australian regime’s hassle and expense. By Phil Honeywood. With a new federal government, appropriately, there has been a great deal of focus on the realignment of government departments and identifying the new key players. Equally, international education stakeholders have taken the opportunity to renew their push for fundamental reform of the governance structures in our industry. Whilst all of this advocacy is good at the macro level, it is important that we do not lose sight of the urgent need to reform some of the seemingly “smaller” regulatory hurdles that continue to hold Australia back. Key amongst these are student visa-related issues: Overseas health checks For a major student destination country, Australia often seems determined to make it as onerous as possible to obtain medical clearance to study here. Rapidly growing source country markets, such as Brazil, have few Australian Government-accredited medical officers. Prospective students are often required to travel vast distances to the few cities in which these doctors practise – once they find them. In contrast, competitor nations such as the UK, Canada and the US have far more accredited medical officers located in more accessible cities. Genuine Temporary Entrance Test (GTE) This seemingly innocuous recommendation (amongst the Michael Knight review’s 41 recommendations) has been the most draconian for many prospective students. Based on subjective criteria, the GTE is responsible for thousands of genuine potential students choosing to apply to countries other than Australia. It has been particularly harsh in its determination of genuine vocational (VET) course applicants. Prospective English-language students considering Australia have even been sent letters from our overseas postings informing them that it would be much cheaper to study English in the UK! Despite recent endeavours by the Immigration Department to review GTE rejection letters automatically in some postings, the damage to “brand Australia” from this entrance test has been severe. Student visa charges On any measure, Australia’s student visa cost regime is a significant barrier to entry for our international education market. Based on a comparative analysis (see chart xxxx) a standard higher education subclass 573 equivalent visa will cost a prospective international student (in Australian dollars) $217 to study in Canada, $256 for New Zealand and $414 for the US. This makes Australia’s $535 visa charge more than double that of two of our key competitor countries. Only the UK comes in slightly higher, at $570 for a student applying offshore. However, this is only the start of the potential visa cost headache for students wanting to study in our country. Twelve months ago, the Gillard government imposed a new $700 visa extension charge for any international student wishing to undertake a new course in this country. In some cultures, such as Latin America, there is a distinct preference to “try before you buy”. In other words, their students will undertake a short course overseas first before deciding to enrol in a more long-term degree. Such students must now pay their standard $535 visa offshore application fee and then cough up a further $700, for a total of $1235! There was no stakeholder consultation on this measure, no opportunity for the beleaguered international education sector to inform our political masters of the impact that a new unilateral impost such as this can have on overseas families making decisions about where to send their children to study abroad. Family member visa applicants When an overseas student wishes to bring their spouse and children with them during their course of study, then Australia’s welcome mat comes at an even higher cost. Based on a family that includes a spouse and two children, Australia’s student visa charges are again significantly higher than any of our competitor countries except for the UK (see chart xxx). Of course, once the family arrives in our country they will then find themselves subject to large discrepancies within our federal system as to the fees they will be required to pay government schools for their children’s tuition. There are certainly soft diplomacy effects here! Visa packaging A further concern centres around Australia’s unwillingness to put together special student visa packaging for groups of sponsored students on scholarships from their home country. Whilst some work is now taking place to be more flexible with such arrangements, enormous damage has already been done to Australia’s reputation as a study destination. Competitor countries such as Canada have been willing to provide rapid turnaround for such sponsored group visa applications, as well as a discounted visa cost for each applicant. A number of Australian education institutions maintain that this has been a disincentive for overseas government programs, such as Brazil’s Science without Borders initiative, to send larger groups of sponsored students to our country in recent years. Australia can rightly be proud of the macro-policy settings that we have put in place to encourage a high-quality robust international education sector. But as with so many aspects of life, it is too often the seemingly little things that can let us down. The manner in which our student visa application and charges regime has been administered is an area that is now overdue for reform. Our comparatively high cost and overly complex student visa framework sends all the wrong messages about what our nation aspires to be as a globally responsible and welcoming study destination of first choice. Phil Honeywood is national executive director of the International Education Association of Australia.