In February 2022, IEAA’s Admissions and Compliance Network distributed a survey to members of the international education community to gather feedback for the ESOS review and PRISMS improvement project, both of which form part of the Australian Strategy for International Education 2021–2030. Formal consultation for the ESOS review is underway and closes at the end of April, while the PRISMS consultation is due to commence in July.
The results of our survey highlighted the great diversity of knowledge and lived experience in our community with more than 60 responses across 13 questions. Not all questions aligned with the 30 sections of the formal consultation but it was interesting to see a great deal of consistency among the concerns and questions of our practitioners.
The survey was into two parts with the first half related to the ESOS review. The question with the most additional responses was “Should full online delivery be available to international students onshore?”. The minority of responses was a hard ‘yes’ or ‘no’ with 46 out of 52 responses providing a qualifying statement. A great deal of respondents suggested that 50% face-to-face delivery would still provide benefits for international students in terms of having an ‘Australian’ experience.
The standard that received the most amount of feedback was Standard 8 (Overseas student visa requirements) related to managing course progress and load, COE extension and online learning as well as Standard 7 (student transfers), with a particular focus on the flow-on impacts of deferrals during COVID-19.
The PRISMS part of the survey also revealed some interesting findings with an overwhelming majority of feedback suggesting that integration between PRISMS and VEVO be a key improvement together with real-time data on student location and the inclusion of several new fields related to visas. There were 17 different admissions, enrolments, CRMs and other systems that respondents listed for integration with PRISMS so this will keep the project team busy.
This has been a valuable exercise to ensure that stakeholders in our sector have an opportunity to be included in consultation for legislation that directly impacts the international education community and our day-to-day work. We thank IEAA Members for taking the time to provide your responses.
The findings of this survey, together with input generated from IEAA’s ESOS Review webinar, held on 15 March 2022, will be mapped into an official response by IEAA. Over 100 Members attended the webinar to listen to the esteemed panel of experts who focused on specific consultation areas, including:
- Expansion and diversification – online delivery – Caryn Nery (IEAA Transnational Education Network Convener)
- Supporting the quality of third‑party relationships – Agents – George Hernandez (IEAA Marketing and Recruitment Network Convener)
- Meeting skills needs and graduate workplace readiness – WIL – Dino Wilcox
- Course transfers – Danielle Hartridge (IEAA Board Member)
- Written Agreements – Paula Soon (IEAA Admissions and Compliance Network Convener).
The recording of the webinar is available for IEAA Members by visiting the Member Centre. A draft will be circulated to provide Members with any further feedback.
The opinions expressed above are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the International Education Association of Australia (IEAA).