An Australian parliamentary inquiry into international education has made wide-ranging recommendations to improve the sector’s competitiveness.
Improving the student experience is one of the recommendations made in an interim report from the inquiry, which suggests addressing accommodation shortages, improving work placement opportunities for international students, and making it easier for Australian companies to hire international students.
The report also urges Australia to expand its recruitment of international students beyond China and India, and from markets like Nigeria, Kenya, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Brazil, Colombia and Chile.
Moses is from Nigeria – he’s one of more than 700 thousand international students who are in Australia to pursue their studies.
Australia is known to be a great country to live and learn in, but this does not make newly arrived international students immune from experiencing some of the problems identified in the interim report.
Moses is pursuing a nursing degree at the Australian Catholic University and arrived in Melbourne a few months ago.
One of the major challenges that international students face when they arrive in Australia is culture shock.
Because international students come from a range of cultural backgrounds, they tend to have different cultural values and practices from those that are practiced in Australia.
Adapting to a new culture and integrating Australian social norms into their daily duties and activities is usually a challenging task.
According to Moses one of the cultural shocks he experienced in Australia is the public transport system – for instance, how long it took him to move around using it, with the size of cities like Melbourne and the lack of frequent trains, trams and buses to get to campus.
Also, the language barrier is a major part of culture shock – with newly arrived international students used to speaking in their native languages, they tend to have difficulties communicating and interacting with other students and the rest of the Australian community.
Different countries also adopt different teaching styles depending on the needs of learners and curriculum objectives in each country.
Some newly arrived international students find the teaching styles used in Australia to be different from the ones that they’re used to.
For this reason, they may take a longer time to understand and comprehend concepts taught during class which may affect their grade during the first few months of learning in Australia.
The interim report recommends improving work placement access for international students.
According to Moses, the Australia education system deals mostly with practical aspects of a field, unlike schools in his country that focus more on theoretical aspects.
Financial constraints are another major challenge for newly arrived international students.
The high cost of accommodation, tuition, and living expenses in Australia may come as a shock to new international students who often need to find part-time work and balancing work with studies for them to be able to manage their student life here.
According to Moses, getting used to Australian pricing was huge for him because of the high margin between his country’s currency and Australia currency.
In addition, “ the work restrictions on a student visa makes it difficult to make enough to sustain myself with basic needs,” he said.
Financial constraints are linked to another challenge that newly arrived international students in Australia face which is difficulties in finding employment.
International students are usually unfamiliar with the job market in the country they have moved to for their studies.
Using university career services can play a major role in helping newly arrived international students understand the steps that they need to take for them to find employment easily.
“Australian employees always look out for experience and it is difficult to have the kind of experience they look out for as a newly arrived immigrant in Australia,” Moses said, explaining that this made it very difficult for him to get a job.
Networking with professionals can also enable newly arrived international students in Australia to gain more knowledge about the job market and, at the same time, help them understand techniques that they can use to improve their employability.
Discrimination is another challenge that some of the newly arrived international students in Australia face.
Even though Australia is a multicultural society that is known to be very welcoming and friendly, discrimination remains an area of concern among international students.
Some international students have spoken about being discriminated against based on race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, or even religion.
The issue of discrimination greatly affects these students’ ability to interact and relate well with other students as well as the Australian community in general.
In Australian cities’ crowded housing markets, finding accommodation is also one of the major issues that newly arrived students in Australia face.
Finding an affordable and comfortable place to live is a huge challenge because even though there exists on-campus and off-campus accommodation options for international students, finding a house that conforms to one’s budget isn’t easy.
Being unable to find accommodation quickly delays international students’ ability to begin adapting to the new culture as soon as possible and start their studies in a timely way.
Addressing accommodation shortages and making it easier for Australian companies to hire international students are two other recommendations from the interim report of the parliamentary inquiry into the sector.
Well-being is an area of concern among international students – the change in climate and struggles that come with the whole transition process may cause major physical, emotional, and mental health issues which may greatly affect studies as well as international students’ ability to socialize and interact with other people.
Overcoming these issues requires newly arrived students in Australia to familiarise themselves with health resources available in the country to improve their health and well-being.
Finally, homesickness represents a key challenge that newly arrived international students face.
A significant percentage of international students in Australia are used to staying with their families.
Being away from their families makes students struggle with homesickness.
Adjusting to a new culture and issues such as the language barrier can intensify feelings of homesickness among newly arrived international students which may affect their ability to learn or cause them to develop a state of loneliness.
Addressing the major challenges that newly arrived international students in Australia face can play a major role in improving student learning.
Different measures and strategies can be put in place to ensure that new international students in the country do not experience these many challenges.
Launched in October 2022 the federal government’s inquiry into the international education sector’s recovery is ongoing.
