The latest data from the Department of Education shows that there were a record 1,095,298 international students enrolled in Australia at the end of 2024, an annual increase of 13%.
There were also a record 571,986 new enrolments at the end of 2024.
Julie Hare from The AFR reports that university tuition fees from international students surged in 2024, with four institutions exceeding $1 billion.
The University of NSW saw a 61% rise in annual revenue from overseas students, rising from $877 million in 2023 to $1.4 billion in 2024. Monash University saw a 42% increase, while Deakin and Curtin increased by a third.
Monash and UNSW joined Sydney University and the University of Melbourne as institutions with $1 billion or more in revenue.
Hare noted that other popular destinations for international students have seen a reduction in enrolments in recent years.
Demand for Canada, once the most desired destination, has plummeted since it implemented caps in 2024.
Numbers in the UK declined for the first time in a decade in 2023-24 after the government prohibited students from bringing partners.
The US Department of State recently ordered the processing of all new applications for international student visas to be put on hold.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio followed this up by indicating that the visas of Chinese nationals who are currently studying in the US will be “aggressively revoked”; this includes students with links to the Communist Party and those who are studying in critical fields.
Universities Australia says the nation’s higher education institutions are willing to enrol “academic refugees’’ who are barred by the Trump administration.
“Australia’s universities are open to the world”, Universities Australia chief executive Luke Sheehy said last week.
“If any students are displaced by policy decisions overseas, Australian universities stand ready to support those affected”.
Education Minister Jason Clare added that “we welcome genuine international students who want to study here’’.
“We have some of the best universities in the world”, Clare said last week.
“International education is a valuable national asset to Australia. It doesn’t just make us money, it makes us friends”.
Research by Dutch analytics company Studyportals found that Australia was the only major destination to register an increase in overseas student demand over the first quarter of 2025.
The report is based on survey responses from 240 institutions in 48 countries, mostly the key education destinations of the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.
The study found that Australia’s share of international student demand has climbed by 8% so far in 2025.
The re-elected Labor government must stem the growth in student and graduate visas by targeting quality over quantity via the following types of reforms:
- Tightening English-language proficiency criteria and requiring prospective students to pass entrance exams before receiving a study visa.
- Increasing financial requirements, including requiring students to deposit money in an escrow account before coming to Australia.
- Limiting the hours overseas students can work and abolishing the direct relationship between studying, working, and acquiring permanent residency.
- Closing down the many sham private colleges that operate as visa mills.
- Allowing only distinction-level or higher international graduates to gain post-study 485 graduate visas.
- Allowing only postgraduate overseas students to bring family members into Australia.
- Increasing the temporary skilled migration income threshold to more than the median full-time earnings (currently around $90,000).
The Albanese government must also tighten the appeals process for the Administrative Review Tribunal to stop temporary migrants (including students) from abusing the system and remaining in Australia after their visa has expired.
These types of reforms would reduce the number of international students, graduates, and bridging visa holders while lifting the average quality and productivity of the migration system.
Sadly, the Albanese government has no genuine interest in stopping the student visa rort.
