Additional reporting by Nicholas Cuthbert Immigration white paper brings compliance conversations to the fore as Tony Blair’s Home Secretary questions rapid rise in international students at mid-ranking institutions. Sector hits back at comments, pointing out that consequences of compliance breaches not worth it for institutions. Concerns also raised about asylum claims, as reports suggest some students are using route to extend stay in UK. Jack Straw, who served as Home Secretary between 1997 and 2001, pointed to parts of the recently released immigration white paper that showed universities ranked between 600 and 1,200 by the Times Higher Education had “expanded…

ICEF and NAFSA co-hosted a featured webinar on 11 June, and the session showcased some important data reflecting a marked downturn in international student interest in the United States over the last eight weeks. Those findings were further amplified through some up-to-the-minute insights from student counsellors in major sending markets around the world.The complete webinar is available for viewing below. IDP’s Vice President External Affairs for the USA, Jessica Sandberg, began the data review by differentiating between “mid funnel” students (those that were fairly advanced in their study planning) and “early funnel” students that were in the beginning stages of…

During a webinar on June 11, sector leaders acknowledged the “tremendous damage” being inflicted on international education in the US, as the ramping up of harmful government policies take hold on student interest.   In particular, the administration’s ongoing suspension of visa interviews, its attacks on Harvard and its travel ban on 12 countries have caused international student interest to fall to its lowest level since mid-pandemic.   New data shared by Keystone Education Group highlighted year-on-year interest falling by 55% and 52% respectively in April and May 2025, coinciding with Trump’s tariff announcements, the start of his ongoing feud…

The High Court of England and Wales says lawyers need to take stronger steps to prevent the misuse of artificial intelligence in their work. In a ruling tying together two recent cases, Judge Victoria Sharp wrote that generative AI tools like ChatGPT “are not capable of conducting reliable legal research.” “Such tools can produce apparently coherent and plausible responses to prompts, but those coherent and plausible responses may turn out to be entirely incorrect,” Judge Sharp wrote. “The responses may make confident assertions that are simply untrue.” That doesn’t mean lawyers cannot use AI in their research, but she said…

Representational Image The United States government on Tuesday warned Indian and international students their visas to study in the US could be withdrawn if they “skip classes, drop out, or leave their course” without intimating their institutes.Such individuals could also lose eligibility for US visas in the future, the US embassy in India said.”If you drop out, skip classes, or leave your program of study without informing your school, your student visa may be revoked, and you may lose eligibility for future US visas. Always adhere to the terms of your visa and maintain your student status to avoid any…

Institutions warned to avoid cynically creating MRes courses as a way to circumnavigate tougher dependant visa laws. “Policy will be enacted upon us” if sector does not work collectively on compliance, says International Education champion. The warning comes as The PIE News covers story of one university rescinding CAS offers after MRes exceeds 25% of quota. University of Birmingham’s vice-chancellor has suggested that some institutions are abusing the “intent” of tougher visa policies by marketing MRes courses as a way for international students to bring their family members to the UK with them. “These are tiny numbers – but they…

Listen in as ICEF’s Craig Riggs and Martijn van de Veen recap a busy week at the annual NAFSA conference in San Diego, and reflect on some of the major news items from the United States over the past month. In the last two weeks alone, those include the US administration’s attempts to decertify Harvard University from the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), a pause on scheduling interview appointments for student visa applicants, and the State Department’s plans to revoke the visa status for some Chinese students.The episode was recorded live in San Diego and features a series of…

After a year of very strong growth in 2023, Ireland’s English Language Teaching (ELT) sector is reporting remarkably stable numbers for 2024, with overall enrolments for the year virtually identical to those from the year before.The full-year data comes from peak body English Education Ireland and was produced by sector research specialists BONARD. Overall number of English language students (shown in blue) and student-weeks (in gold) taught by English Education Ireland members, 2019–2024. Source: EEIAs the chart reflects, however, student-weeks declined by -8% year-over-year owing to a continuing decline in average course duration. From a pre-pandemic average of nearly 12…

Uncertainty across the ‘big four’ study destinations have hit IDP’s student enrolment pipeline for the 2025 financial year, new documents reveal. It comes as the US continues to be buffeted by an unpredictable Trump administration, the UK looks set to introduce stricter immigration policies and Canada and Australia appear to be keeping restrictive international education policies in place following their respective elections. In a market update released today, the Australia-based education giant predicted that market headwinds would cause its student placement volumes to drop by an estimated 28-30% during this financial year. It cited aggregated visa data across its four…