Territories and nations like South Korea and Hong Kong, a part of the so-called “Asian Tigers” alongside Singapore and Taiwan, now view worldwide college students and intra-East Asian mobility as vital to sustaining financial progress within the area.
“We’ve a really totally different financial scenario in comparison with the UK or Canada. We don’t have an employment drawback – actually, we want extra individuals and extra expertise throughout the board,” mentioned James Tang, secretary-general, College Grants Committee, Hong Kong SAR, throughout a session on the Worldwide Greater Training Discussion board 2025, held final week on the College of Birmingham.
“Our path to financial progress should shift – pushed extra by innovation and know-how,” he added.
A broader immigration crackdown in recent times throughout main research locations, together with the UK, US, Canada, and Australia, has had vital repercussions for worldwide college students.
The US, beneath Trump, has imposed research visa interview freezes, elevated social media vetting, and revoked visas over private views and nationality.
Canada continues to implement tightened restrictions on short-term residents, whereas Australia and the UK have proposed coverage measures to make it tougher for worldwide college students to enter and stay of their nations.
These adjustments, mixed with extra inexpensive choices nearer to residence, relaxed residency necessities, decrease tuition charges, and world-renowned universities, at the moment are prompting the historically West-bound cohort from East Asia to look inward for larger schooling alternatives.
In keeping with a British Council report, pupil mobility inside East Asia grew extra quickly between 2013 and 2020 than mobility from the area to main English-speaking vacation spot nations.
We’re now specializing in components of the world which had been beforehand inconceivable to us as potential pupil markets
James Tang, UGC, Hong Kong
Whereas over 140,000 college students from East Asia studied in China in 2018, its particular administrative area, Hong Kong, is advancing its “Examine in Hong Kong” model, positioning the territory as an rising worldwide hub for post-secondary schooling.
Between 2019/20 and 2021/22, the variety of worldwide college students enrolled in Hong Kong’s eight universities rose from 12,349 to 13,376, with round 65% coming from Mainland China.
In an effort to diversify that pupil physique, Hong Kong is more and more focusing on college students from India, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, and different nations.
“With the proper sources and help, we’re serving to universities work collectively to achieve out to potential markets. Our longer-term technique is to advertise broader consciousness of Hong Kong’s establishments globally,” acknowledged Tang.
“One attention-grabbing improvement is the opportunity of attracting extra college students from Afghanistan and Indonesia. We’re now specializing in components of the world which had been beforehand inconceivable to us as potential pupil markets.”
Though Tang acknowledged the challenges of job creation and the scarcity of inexpensive housing in Hong Kong, he emphasised the necessity to develop campuses that cater to worldwide college students.
“To remain aggressive as a small area with huge internationalisation ambitions, we have to construct campuses which are really cosmopolitan and various.”
Much like Hong Kong’s schooling branding efforts, South Korea has been advancing its “300K” venture, which goals to spice up the variety of worldwide college students at its universities to 300,000 by 2027.
As of June 2024, the determine had reached 236,000, a rise of 29,000 from the earlier 12 months and a major bounce from round 170,000 recorded in 2022.
Whereas South Korea is barely starting to embrace the concept of welcoming extra worldwide college students, there’s additionally a rising effort to spotlight their worth to the nation’s ageing inhabitants, which now makes up a major majority.
“We have to spotlight that internationalisation isn’t nearly bringing in worldwide college students nevertheless it’s additionally about how these packages affect our home college students, their schooling, and future employment,” defined Jun Hyun Hong, professor on the Faculty of Public Service, Chung-Ang College, South Korea.
South Korea’s push to draw extra worldwide college students is pushed by its must counter a declining fertility charge and an ageing labour, however the effort can also be challenged by nationalist sentiment and issues over job competitors.
“If we wish internationalisation to be significant, we’ve got to take a number of key points critically and assume otherwise about how we method them,” acknowledged Hong.
“The federal government, universities, and business should work collectively to make sure these efforts aren’t solely profitable but in addition sustainable in the long term.”
In keeping with Hong, areas like South Korea and Hong Kong don’t must look to nations just like the UK, US, or Canada for steering on being a bunch nation, as an alternative, they need to concentrate on leveraging their very own strengths.
“I don’t assume Korea ought to attempt to change into just like the US or the UK. We have to observe our personal mannequin that matches our nationwide context and values,” mentioned Hong.
Furthermore, packages like Campus Asia, which promote trilateral tutorial collaboration between South Korea, China, and Japan, have now additionally been prolonged to ASEAN nations via the Korea-ASEAN AIMS (Asian Worldwide Mobility for College students) venture.
“What’s encouraging is that this program is now being prolonged to incorporate ASEAN nations as effectively,” defined Hong.
“If we wish to be environment friendly and make actual progress, we have to construct on these sorts of alternate packages.”
Because the US schooling sector undergoes vital adjustments, together with cutbacks, funding reductions, and downsizing, stakeholders like Tang need to the UK to bolster its already robust instructional partnership with Hong Kong, seeing it as a relationship that would profit East Asia.
This comes because the Trump administration strikes to prohibit Chinese language pupil visas and restrict US universities’ partnerships with Chinese language establishments, citing “nationwide safety” issues.
“Of our 6,000 ongoing analysis initiatives, over half contain companions from Mainland China, with the remaining largely coming from the US adopted by the UK, Germany, and France,” acknowledged Tang.
“We at present have about 400 analysis collaborations with British universities, and there are nonetheless many alternatives to develop, each in analysis funding and pupil alternate.”
In keeping with Tang, the present headwinds dealing with Hong Kong universities’ partnerships with US establishments current a chance to deepen collaboration between Hong Kong and the UK.
“As our personal technique evolves and world situations change, there’s vital potential for us to step up our engagement with UK establishments,” he mentioned.
