The Chinese government should raise international student fees in line with popular student destinations like the US and UK, researchers have recommended, as president Xi calls for more investment in China’s higher education system. 

A study from the Beijing Institute of Technology said international tuition fees could be increased by up to five times the existing price to help universities compete with other institutions around the world and increase the quality of Chinese higher education.

In 2010, China set out a plan to attract 500,000 foreign students, a figure the country almost reached in 2018 when it hit 492,185 international students. 

The bulk of students in China come from other Asian countries including South Korea, Thailand, Pakistan and India, as well as a significant proportion from the US. 

Students are in part attracted by the country’s relatively low tuition fees. Currently non-domestic students pay around 20,000 yuan per year (USD $2,807) in tuition fees at Chinese universities, but researchers suggested this could be increased to 100,000 yuan ($14,000). 

The Chinese government is giving the study “serious consideration”, reported the South China Morning Post. 

Grace Zhu, China branch director at BONARD, said the move could “potentially bring in more revenue for Chinese universities, which could be used to reinvest in infrastructure, research, and other aspects of the educational system”. 

“This could help attract more students in the long term by improving the quality of education and facilities,” Zhu added. 

“Many students choose to study in China is because of the relatively low cost of education”

However she also warned it may cause China to lose students in the short term. 

“One of the reasons why many students from countries like Pakistan and Thailand choose to study in China is because of the relatively low cost of education compared to other destinations,” she said. “If fees are raised too high, it could make it difficult for some students to afford studying here.”

China’s drive to attract overseas students has been ongoing as part of the country’s Belt and Road Initiative, which has seen China invest in global infrastructure and engagement, as well as offering scholarships to students from target countries.

Zhu suggested a gradual increase in fees, which would help students adjust to the changes while allowing Chinese institutions to compete with top-ranked universities in other countries. 

“Ultimately, we would need to attract and recruit more international students with certain diversity to enhance China’s position and importance as [a] studying abroad destination,” Zhu said.

Some Chinese universities have raised domestic tuition fees by up to 54% this year as a response to a fall in government spending on tertiary education, Reuters reported. 

It comes as Xi spoke in May about the need to improve the attractiveness of China’s education system to recruit more international students and counteract the number of Chinese young people leaving the country to study abroad. 

He reportedly said the development of world-class universities should be prioritised. He added that the study in China brand should be “vigorously” promoted “to enhance the international influence and discourse power of our country’s education”. 

Xi also stressed the importance of universities developing courses that meet the country’s strategic needs as the country’s youth unemployment rate hit a new high of over 20% in April. 

According to analysis by Goldman Sachs, one of the reasons behind this is “mismatches between skillset graduates acquired from their higher education and skillset required by employers in industry”. 

Analysts said this “might have caused frictions in the labour market and therefore contributed to high youth unemployment rate”. 

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New data from IIE Open Doors has suggested that the US’s English language inbound program has finally begun to bounce back from a crippling pandemic.

In its latest survey of Intensive English Programs, the data suggests that in-person study is very much back in fashion, with the “vast majority of students” coming in-person in 2022.

Some 61,406 students were studying at 348 intensive English programs in the US during 2022, which Open Doors says reflects a 63% increase year-on-year.

Cheryl Delk-Le-Good, executive director at the country’s language school association EnglishUSA, told The PIE News at NAFSA 2023 that the rebound was a definite cause for “celebration”.

She also said schools will “need to keep working on” getting student numbers up, with the help of EnglishUSA and vital support from EducationUSA.

Despite the encouraging Open Doors data, the sector still has a long way to go to reach its peak 2015-16 levels, where over 133,000 students enrolled in IEPs in the US.

“One thing to keep in mind is that we had been seeing some declines even previous to Covid,” Mirka Martel, head of research, evaluation and learning at IIE, told The PIE in an exclusive interview.

Decline was said to be “stabilising” in 2020 after numbers fell 3.5% in 2019. The 2018 year had seen a reduction of some 10%.

“Of course, we also saw that decrease due to the Covid – but what we’re also now seeing is increases across all types of providers – not only independent providers, but also providers at UC or affiliated with the US higher education.

“That’s super exciting because it means that students are receiving all types of activity and really it marks a real turnaround from that Covid trend,” she continued.

However, what still seems to need some time to recover is the amount of student week enrolment across the US.

At its peak in 2015, the figure was 1,993,917, just shy of two million. Even in 2019, it was still over a million.

The latest figure is up on the 467,368 in 2021 by over 50%, with 669,705 student weeks in total, but rebounding to the high of two million in 2015 appears to be quite a long way away.

“We had been seeing some declines even previous to Covid”

According to Martel, while Asian students are returning to IEPs in droves, the European market’s bounce back is primarily being fuelled by those independent providers.

“[Independent courses] are usually shorter in duration, and they’re becoming more popular with the quicker rebounding markets in Europe,” Martel explained.

The data does indicate that Europeans are generally going to the US for the shortest amount of time. On average, they only stay for a program for seven weeks.

Meanwhile, Latin American and Caribbean students stay for 10 weeks, Asian students for 12, but students from across Africa and the Middle East stay for 17 weeks on average.

“The [programs] that are affiliated with the US HEIs are much more likely to be attracting Chinese or Japanese students, for example,” she noted.

Japanese students make up 16% of the total 61,000 students, taking the top spot in places of origin – and from 2021, their numbers are a meteoric rise of 104%.

France is the second biggest country in terms of place of origin, with just shy of 8% of the overall market share – and an 82% rise in 2021.

While it had a slight lull in US higher education interest in 2022, China’s student numbers on IEPs in the country are also rising. While only 22% higher than 2021, it is still sending almost 5,000 students for IEPs.

While the discussion around independent providers was a focus for Open Doors, it is important to note that 89% of IEPs in the US are still provided by HEIs.

“We are starting to see some of the difference between those that are affiliated with the US HEIs and those that are the individual providers – HEIs are not getting less popular – it’s more that the trends are shifting,” Martel noted.

Also noted in the report was the fact that over a quarter of those in IEPs in 2022 (27%) intended to study in the US after they’d finished their course – the vast majority of whom will need to be taking English tests to facilitate further study at universities.

This, Martel said, is where a new partnership with ETS comes in – wherein there will be a new focus on data sharing to better streamline the exams process.

“The US has sorely underutilised its capacity”

“We’re also exploring areas in which we can use further data analysis and really provide a service to the international higher education field regarding data trends and market trends.

“So for that reason, I think it will be a great opportunity for us to partner with ETS, to really look at what data they have, what data we have and how we can complement each other,” she said.

In an interview with The PIE, ETS senior vice president of global workskills Rohit Sharma told The PIE that the partnership expansion is taking its “current products, but just expanding our partnership to new markets”, through IIE’s reach.

“The academic capacity in the US of professors and lecturers and all of the support staff is much larger, but more importantly also the ecosystem capacity of housing and transportation is there too.

“The next three most popular countries are really at the brink of breaking at the seams. And the US has sorely under-utilised its capacity,” Sharma noted, citing IIE’s partnership as the best way forward to help both the general mobility to the US – and its own market value.

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Urgent reform is needed if UK higher education is to remain sustainable in the global sector and maintain political support, a former UK Universities minister has warned.

Speaking at Westminster Higher Education Forum policy conference on the future for international students in the UK, Lord Jo Johnson urged the UK to introduce four steps that he says should be “proactively” embraced by the sector.

He suggested changes need to be made and concerns confronted “head on” or the sector risks seeing “weakened” political consensus in support of international student recruitment growth.

Among the amendments suggested included increased “collective action” to weed out poor quantity and fraudulent applications by the sector, while application fees for international students could result in higher enrolment conversion rates.

“Universities should require that tuition fees should be paid upfront,” Johnson continued. “They should require maintenance funds be put into an escrow account borrowing from Canada’s guaranteed investment certificate model.”

The GIC in Canada requires students on the fast-track Student Direct Stream to place CAN$10,000 in a secure account before arriving in the country to demonstrate the financial ability to afford to study costs.

Johnson, who said he has been advocating for the UK to introduce a similar scheme for a number of years, indicated that it would “help address related problems of fraud and the lack of diversification in our system”.

“It’s a complete no brainer that the UKVI needs to put this in place to… ensure that we have a system that is absolutely nailed down [and where] international students actually have the funds they claim to have. There’s no good policy reason not to do it.”

He also proposed “greater accountability for recruitment agents” including a register of recruitment agents and publication of KPIs relating to visa refusals, non-continuation and completion rates.

The Office for Students needs “to get a grip on” high dropout rates (which he said are approaching 25% for students from India and Bangladesh) and the regulator would benefit by requiring universities to publish annual statements on international student recruitment plans.

“There is a striking absence of forward-looking information in the public domain”

An overall picture of future UK trends would “enable the regulator to gain insights into individual recruitment strategies and the risk that institutions might be running”.

“At the moment, there is a striking absence of forward-looking information in the public domain about the emerging composition of the student body [as well as] the backward looking data [being…] very stale,” he said. “We need much greater visibility into the plans.”

Three concerns that the sector must grapple with include the reliance on postgraduate recruitment, the view that some education is being sold as immigration and the diversification of the international student cohort.

The “false narrative” that international students are displacing domestic students at UK institutions needs to be addressed, he added.

Janet Ilieva, director and founder of Education Insight, warned that a growing reliance on particular countries – especially as European students continue to turn away from the UK largely as a result of increased cost due to Brexit – and a drop in diversity will have an impact on student experience.

The UK’s graduate route – which was supported, along with growth in international student numbers, by a “political consensus” – remains in place. There had been fears that the government would curtail the scheme as part of a crackdown on students related to a reduction in net migration targets.

“That consensus has weakened considerably in the past year or so,” Johnson said.

It would be a mistake for the sector to “cry foul” and look at recent policy announcements on PGT dependants as “collateral damage” in the government’s push to reduce net migration, he maintained.

“Let’s be clear, the economic benefits are actually pretty well understood… so too are the benefits that international students bring to our universities,” he added, pointing to the recent report from HEPI and Kaplan which found that international students added £42 billion to the UK economy in 2021/22.

“[But] it’s important that if we’re going to have a sustainable sector role in the international market for higher education, I think we do need to address these concerns that remain.”

Johnson also suggested that “the days of government support for further rapid growth in international student numbers are probably over for now at least”.

The recent international strategy recommitment did not include the words “at least” before the 600,000 target, he noted.

“Those two words have gone missing from the language with which we talk about the international education strategy,” he said, which can be interpreted in a number of ways.

“The future should be bright, but only if the sector reforms”

The “worst interpretation” is that 600,000 is now a “de facto cap” and at the other end is that 600,000 is “an annual target rather than a floor from which the sector can expect to see continued rapid growth”, he maintained.

“We are at a critical moment, really, in my view, where the sector needs to do much more to win back political support that’s been sacrificed over the past couple of years for the very positive role that international students play in our system.

“The future should be bright, but only if the sector reforms and deals with many of the real issues that have surfaced during the last two or three years of growth, particularly since the graduate route was reintroduced,” Johnson concluded.

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The Higher Education Commission of Pakistan has issued a warning to students and parents about violations made by Pakistani institutions in their TNE programs, resulting in degree non-recognition.

“It has been observed with grave concern that several Pakistani institutions offering qualifications in collaboration with foreign universities under TNE Policy are violating HEC policies while granting admission to students,” the warning read.

As a result, students are facing problems having their degrees recognised or equivalence agreed from the HEC, the statement said.

The HEC also took the opportunity to warn all recognised domestic HEIs providing courses leading to foreign qualifications in Pakistan to ensure that they follow all the legal and procedural requirements outlined in the government’s TNE policy. If a violation is made, the student in question’s degree will not be recognised, it warned.

* 𝐁𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐓𝐍𝐄 𝐏𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐲 𝐕𝐢𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 *
Institutions offering qualifications in collaboration with foreign universities pic.twitter.com/UckxfLVlYs

— HEC Pakistan (@hecpkofficial) April 16, 2023

“The notice highlights the need for overseas universities (including those from the UK) to understand the need for due diligence when working with local partners,” the British Council said in a statement following the warning.

The notice highlights the need for overseas universities to understand the need for due diligence

“Adhering to Pakistan’s policies and meeting the necessary standards set out by local regulations will help to minimise any risk of reputational damage for UK institutions and enhance business continuity with their partners in Pakistan,” it continued.

“The HEC, which is responsible for regulating higher education in Pakistan, gives considerable importance to the quality assurance of TNE provision in Pakistan. This has become more significant with the steady rise in the number of TNE students observed in the past few years.”

According to the British Council, the total number of students studying on a UK TNE program in Pakistan has increased by 49%, from 5,950 in 2018-19 to 8,200 in 2020-21 – with the vast majority (95%) of students studying distance learning and online education programs.

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Tuition and living costs represent the most important pull factors for Chinese students as they decide where to study abroad, a new piece of research has found.

Chinese students also put greater importance on whether their degrees abroad would help them get a job back in China. Experts suggested the students’ desire for jobs in their home country might be explained by political tensions between the US and China.

The Pull factors in choosing a higher education study abroad destination after the massive global immobility: A reexamination from Chinese perspectives study was carried out by Ka Ho Mok, from Lingnan University in Hong Kong and Baohua Lucy Yu, also from Lingnan University.

The quantitative research set out to establish pull factors considered and valued by prospective Chinese international students and their parents following the pandemic.

Researchers surveyed 1,054 students and 184 parents between November 2022 and January 2023.

The top factors for students when deciding where to study were tuition cost (83.87%), living cost (69.55%), tuition language (67.74%) and Chinese employment prospects (54.84%).

The factors that parents took into account were similar – tuition cost (84.24% was most commonly cited), followed by living cost (68.48%), tuition language (63.59%), world ranking of institutions (53.26%), and then Chinese employment prospects (51.63%).

“Both parents and students, they have taken tuition cost and also living cost as the top factors, when conceiving a plan for overseas learning…,” Ka Ho Mok said during a recent webinar with the Centre for Global Higher Education, where the findings were discussed.

“The domestic, regional and also the global economy has been truly affected [by Covid-19] and that is why they have to take the financial capacity into consideration.”

Students from China have in the past typically been said to look to rankings when deciding on where to study abroad, but graduate employment has become increasingly important.

In the research, 48% noted world ranking as a pull factor, and 45% said the same for world ranking of institution.

Presenting the findings, Baohua Lucy Yu explained that 6,560,600 Chinese people obtained international degrees between 1978 and 2019.

However, Covid-19 led to immobility of Chinese students with global lockdowns at the peak of the pandemic. Inbound students were trapped in a “double bind” where air tickets for them to come back to China were extremely expensive.

“There’s a report of one ticket from New York to China was about $25,000 per ticket, almost seven times the normal price,” said Yu.

However, while China changed its zero tolerance policy around Covid to one of coexistence in January 2023, meaning mobility has improved, the research shows that Chinese students and parents are still conscious of the costs of studying abroad.

Some have also suggested that the pandemic created a complex set of challenges for students from the region.

Another key finding was that 54.84% of students cited Chinese employment prospects as a pull factor.

Yu said that immigration opportunities used to be more important for Chinese students – however this is changing.

“As we know the international relationship between China, and the allies of the US have led to a new cold war and major other western powers,” she said.

“I think for the Chinese parents and Chinese students, they may worry about safety issues… if they went to those countries, whether they would be treated equally or whether they would be discriminated [against],” she added.

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One of the topics highlighted during sessions at spring conferences, such as NAFSA, ASU +GSV and DETcon, was AI and its implications on the international education sector.

While some stakeholders indicated early AI conversation fatigue, particularly around ChatGTP, others asserted that the sector has just scratched the surface.

Global engagement education technology provider Terra Dotta, announced plans to integrate generative AI into its global engagement platform. Discussing the new feature at NAFSA, the company said it will be applied to automate pre-determined education abroad and international education marketing communications processes.

Terra Dotta proffered automation will “[streamline] administrative tasks”, freeing up time and resources of university global engagement offices, resulting in additional time for personalised student supports.

Anthony Rotoli, CEO of Terra Dotta, noted the often understaffed and under resourced global education offices that find themselves on the receiving end of increasing numbers of study abroad applications that have surpassed pre-pandemic numbers.

“The growth is phenomenal,” Rotoli said, “but international education pros need more support and AI has shown to be a valuable way to address resource challenges.”

Using the new AI tools, Terra Dotta said it will be able to increase the editorial capacity of global offices at HEIs, assisting staff with the automation of initial communications. Additionally, repetitive tasks will be eliminated. Examples of some of the work AI will automate are the creation of emails, brochures, and texts, which can be completed in minutes. As well, the topic and tone can be customised based on the target audience.

“The focus should be less on what we can do with AI and more on what we should do”

Marcus DeWitt, founder and director of Blue Ivy Coaching, also weighed in on potential implications of AI in the field. “I think there’s a lot of potential. The main question I have is about its precision.

“It’s important to understand that to go from a 90% to a 99% step up, is going to take a while. The challenge I see with companies at the forefront is that we work in an industry where the information you need to provide is very precise. And imprecision can lead to disaster. It can be pretty catastrophic when misinformation is provided to a student.”

That said, DeWitt countered, “Ultimately, the real centrepiece of the conversation shouldn’t be the advisor or the counsellor, but the student. And if AI built into a high-touch, human-based advising service, then I’m all for it.”

Likewise, consultant and Education Rethink co-founder and managing director Anna Esaki-Smith highlighted both sides of the coin in her recent white paper, co-authored by Duolingo English Test’s senior strategic engagement executive Lindsay Addington.

In the report, entitled, The impact of generative AI on higher education: Voices from the field, the authors contend, “The impact of AI is not without concerns and limitations for the higher education sector, which include algorithmic bias, academic integrity, and data protection.”

They also highlighted the potential lack of human interaction inherent in the process and that it may lead to fewer opportunities for students to cultivate their critical thinking skills.

“As AI becomes further integrated into higher education, we must critically evaluate its benefits and drawbacks in order to develop proper guidelines for ensuring that it is used responsibly,” Esaki-Smith and Addington asserted.

In conducting their qualitative study, they interviewed stakeholders from across the sector. Yet, regardless of participants’ roles or other demographics, a similar theme of cautious optimism emerged.

Participants acknowledged potential AI benefits for students, noting the use of ChatGTP to help find admissions and scholarship information quickly, thus “disrupting” the field of education consultants and agents and the application services provide.

“There is a significant opportunity for AI to serve as an efficiency-gainer and to change the pace of evolution in education,” said John Wilkerson, AVP for international services at Indiana University, in the report.

Julie Collins, assistant dean of graduate admissions and financial aid at Northwestern Medill, spoke in the report about the benefits of AI for international students, stating, “International students want to use all the tools available to them to be successful in [the] admissions process to go to that top-tier school.

“Studying abroad at a desirable university has been a goal and could be a game-changer for them and even their family,” she added.

The concept of ethics was also highlighted by all participants in the study. “To better understand and address the ethical implications of AI systems, we must better understand the potential biases in training data and prompt engineering,” said Esaki-Smith and Addington. And they said to accomplish this will require a multidisciplinary approach.

“As we continue to evolve and adapt to new technologies, the focus should be less on what we can do with AI and more on what we should do,” they summarised.

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International students are falling victim to sexual exploitation and are being used to traffic drugs in the Greater Toronto Area, Canada, an NGO has said.

Sunder Singh is the executive director of the Elspeth Heyworth Centre for Women, an organisation that supports women in the Toronto community.

She told The PIE News that Canada’s high cost of living paired with tuition fees have made female students enter the sex trade out of desperation.

The PIE has also found numerous massage parlours that are advertising services from international students in the Greater Toronto Area.

“Brampton is where we see the hub of exploitation happening,” Singh told The PIE.

“The rents are very high here. The cost of living is extremely high and the students who are coming are paying four times more in their fee expenses.

“Parents have sold their land and jewellery and their assets to send the child here to Canada with the hope that, you know, once he or she gets them permanent resident status, then the family will be called here.”

Canada has seen over 800,000 international students arrive in 2022 – an increase of almost a third in one year, according to government data.

Singh said that while the idea of bringing young students to Canada was a “wonderful idea”.

However, according to Singh, the long-term vision of the government has been lacking.

“The government could not see the problems when these young people come without parents, without family, without any adults to support them and keep them on track,” she said.

“They were sent here and they saw freedom for the first time and they were vulnerable, very easily exploited.”

“Out of desperation, the girls especially, started to enter the sex trade”

The PIE reported last week on female international students needing more support to prevent exploitation by employers.

“They desire to have some money so that they could pay rent and have decent food and have a little bit of decent living… Out of desperation, the girls especially, started to enter the sex trade,” Singh continued.

The PIE News has identified a number of massage parlours around Toronto are openly saying they use Indian students for sex work.

Four separate high street spas, published adverts on escort and classified advert websites advertising escort and erotic massage services from “Indian students”.

Singh told The PIE that in one of the Brampton hospitals, about 18 to 20 girls are going for abortions every month.

“Some of the doctors have said that this was unheard of… of course if you are working in the sex trade, many men don’t want to use protection,” she added.

Singh said it is hard to say exactly how many students are being affected, due to the fact that many do not want to come forward to speak about their experiences.

However, information about the female students comes to her and her team directly from students, community residents living and/or working in Brampton, relatives of the community whose members live in Brampton, truck drivers whose colleagues use the services given by the girls.

Last year, the centre met with approximately 80 students, all facing financial challenges and currently it sees over 12 students every week who come for food and clothing.

Sex for rent and exploitation

Elspeth Heyworth Centre for Women has also become aware of landlords and employers who have exploited female students.

“A one bedroom basement apartment is $1,600. The girls cannot afford it, you know, they have to pay their fees. They have a limited income. And for them, it’s very difficult to pay,” Singh told The PIE.

“Landlords, for example, will say, ‘well, you know, you don’t have to pay one month’s rent and as long as you can sleep with me tonight’.”

Elspeth Heyworth Centre for Women currently works with local banks, who say sometimes a young female students share pass codes with boyfriends.

“So the boyfriend is maybe posing as a boyfriend, but he’s probably pimping, and the girl doesn’t even know that.

“If the money is taken out of her account without her knowledge and her account is completely wiped out, she is now completely dependent on this man,” Singh said.

Singh explained that this happened with an Indian student the centre was working with last year.

“It has happened to one of the girls here where, you know, she trusted the boy, moved in with him. He got hold of all her passwords and then completely emptied her bank account and got her pregnant.

“She had to get two abortions and he started to beat her. She had to look after his house and prepare food for him, and she became his slave until a neighbour noticed that she was now domestically abused and somebody suggested to her to call the police when she did. And that’s when, you know, we came to the rescue.”

Male students have also reportedly been targeted for exploitation, according to Singh.

“The boys, many of them who have come here, have learned truck driving, which is a nice skill to have. They get paid well. However, these young boys get exploited very easily by people,” Singh said.

She explained that the male students who have jobs working as truck drivers are being coerced into transporting drugs.

Social media

Singh told The PIE that social media is used by those who want to exploit vulnerable students.

“The youth right now, they are on social media and social media is where they become most vulnerable. And being alone in Canada, they’re seeking companionship.

“Social media is where they become most vulnerable”

“So these perpetrators are posing as boyfriends and buying expensive gifts and taking them out for dinner, etc. And then after they have won the trust of these vulnerable girls, they say, ‘okay, can you do me a favour? I need money’, suddenly.

“Then, you know, ‘this friend of mine is also in trouble, so could you please go and see him, and collect money from him?’ So when she goes there, she gets raped and then the trafficking starts from then onwards.”

Singh explained that it is very easy to blackmail Indian girls.

“Because if he says, ‘I’m going to send a video to your parents’, she will not allow that. She’d rather go through the trafficking than to have the parents know.”

Students are also often reluctant to reach out for help due to fears around their visas, making them even more vulnerable according to Singh.

The PIE contacted IRCC for comment but did not receive a response.

Universities Canada declined on the issues raised in this article and The PIE did not receive a response from the government of Ontario.

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Universities in Wales and Canada have reached a new agreement to strengthen educational cooperation between the two countries.

Institutions have committed to developing long-term relationships and promoting collaboration between the nations under a new Memorandum of Understanding signed by Universities Wales and Universities Canada on May 30. 

Under the agreement, the organisations plan to increase short-term staff and student exchanges as well as enhance research and development collaborations in areas including green energy, technology, health and wellbeing, and the creative industries. 

They will also try and develop new sector partnerships and strengthen “bilateral relationships” between the two countries’ education sectors.  

“A vibrant, knowledge-based economy relies on having a well-educated population, and collaboration is key to developing education and research systems that deliver for society,” said Kieron Rees, assistant director of Universities Wales.

He added that the agreement will “open doors to collaborative activities that will mutually benefit both our countries and advance our shared excellence”.

“It represents another step in our positive relationship with our Canadian partners, and we look forward to working with Universities Canada for the benefit of our two countries.”

“It’s more important than ever to cultivate long-term relationships between peoples, cultures and societies”

Paul Davidson, president of Universities Canada, said the organisation was “proud” to sign the agreement. 

“In today’s increasingly interconnected world, it’s more important than ever to cultivate long-term relationships between peoples, cultures and societies,” he added. 

Wales has committed £65 million to increasing inbound and outbound student exchanges between 2021-2026 under the country’s Taith scheme, which was launched in response to Brexit. 

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