This week, the HESA Higher Education Student Statistics (UK, 2022/23) were published.
In response to this a Universities Scotland Spokesperson has said:
“The HESA data set it is a snap-shot from almost two-years ago, before we saw sudden fluctuations in international demand and a further year of the threats of more restrictive changes to UK immigration policy. That means this data does not provide a sense of what universities are experiencing now.
We are hopeful that the volatility of the last year has levelled out, but we won’t know the real impact of this for some months. Whilst Universities cannot control global geopolitical issues, which have undoubtedly had an impact on the number of students choosing to come to Scotland over the last 12 months, we can be confident in the strength of our academic offer and student experience. We continue to offer Scotland as a warm and welcoming destination for those who wish to come here in the future.
Another known in our environment is the extent to which the funding level invested in our Scottish-domiciled students has become dependent on fees from international students. Public funding levels per student are down nearly 20% over the last ten years and cross-subsidy has now become essential for most institutions. That makes the volatility in international student recruitment a far bigger concern and one that everyone in Scotland should be worried about.
Until last year, strong growth in recruitment from India and Nigeria was partly linked to the policy framework in place, which allows post study work upon successful graduation and which did, until January, allow students to bring their families with them. We are delighted that the UK Government has committed to retain the post study work visa on the same two-year term as before. When it comes to the highly competitive nature of recruitment markets, that is an important part of the appeal to prospective students.”
Read more on this story on our Blog, which goes into a deeper dive of HESA figures as well as this week’s SQA results and UCAS figures.