The quality of the educational experience for both international and domestic undergraduate students at Australian universities has improved since the pandemic.
The results of the 2022 student experience and international student experience surveys have been released today and show encouraging trends, although the impacts of COVID-19 are still being felt.
In 2022, the largest source of countries international undergraduate students were from included China, with around 24 per cent of SES international student responses, followed by Nepal, India, Vietnam and Malaysia, which together make up almost 60 per cent of total undergraduate international student responses.
Minister for Education Jason Clare said in a statement:
“It’s great to see the high quality of teaching at Australian universities be recognised by both international and domestic students. It’s a testament to the hard work of our educators. The results underscore Australia’s great reputation for delivering high quality education.”
The two annual surveys collect data from students across 141 higher education providers, including 42 universities.
International students make up around 17 per cent of undergraduate responses mainly sourced from 5 countries (China, Nepal, India, Vietnam and Malaysia) which make up almost 60 per cent of total undergraduate international responses.
International undergraduate students are mainly clustered in just a few study areas and institutions, with Business and management, Computing and information systems and Nursing.
For 2022, Indian international students have rated Australian institutions highly on Skills Development (87.6%), Learner Engagement (71.6%), Teaching Quality (83.8%), Student Support (83.2%), Learning Resources (87.75), and Quality of entire educational experience (77.8%).
The report notes that, in general, Indian and Nepalese respondents tended to rate having family and friends in Australia and the possibility of permanent residency/migration as key reasons to come here to study than Chinese, Vietnamese and Malaysian respondents.
importance rating) / Source: Table 16 – 2022 SES.
As per the report, the proportion of international student respondents located off-shore at the time of the survey increased from 12.1 per cent of undergraduate respondents in 2020 to 33.9 per cent in 2021 and back down to 8.9 per cent in 2022.
According to the surveys, the quality of Australian educators has been recognised with international students recording an all-time high rating for teaching quality at 80 per cent, on par with domestic students.
The Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching (QILT) are a suite of government endorsed surveys for higher education, across the student life cycle from commencement to employment.
Other key findings include:
- The rating international students gave to the quality of their entire educational experience rose 7 per cent to 74 per cent.
- Domestic students rated the quality of their entire educational experience at 76 per cent, up from 74 per cent.
- Female students rate their experience higher (77 per cent) than male students (74 per cent).
- Students aged over 40 rates their experience higher (81 per cent) than those under 40.
- International undergraduate students rated their overall living experience in Australia highly, with 94 per cent of international students rating their living experience positively.
- International students rated personal safety and security as the main reason for studying in Australia at 96 per cent.
- Students studying agriculture and environmental studies (84 per cent), veterinary science (81 per cent) and rehabilitation (82 per cent) rated their overall experience highest.
The full results from the 2022 Student Experience Survey and the 2022 International Student Experience Survey can be found at the QILT website www.qilt.edu.au.