Highlights
- Prior to the pandemic, online learning was worth around $9 million dollars, but by the end of 2020 it had rocketed to $3.3 billion
- The Mitchell Institute's report shows by November 2020 just 17,000 new overseas students have enrolled, massively short of the usual 120,000 every six months
- Currently about 260,000 fewer international students are living in Australia than before the COVID-19 pandemic
According to Victoria University's Mitchell Institute, the international education sector is set to shrink from $40.3 billion to $20.5 billion.
Predictions of a 50 per cent drop in enrolment devastated not only institutions all over Australia, but the decline has impacted several other entities that cater to students' needs.
Education Policy Fellow Peter Hurley from the Mitchell Institute explains.
"You're looking at the international sector, the value of the international sector halving, the international education sector halving within, by the end of next year and that's going to have huge ramifications. It's important to remember that actually universities pretty much only account for a quarter of that value. A lot of the value of international students actually comes in the form of spending in the wider economy so think about say property, or retail and so on so it’s not just universities who are going to be affected by this, there's a lot of different parts of the economy and society that will be impacted."
