Australia: DIBP stats reveal impact of working holiday visas on education exports

Published 04/08/2016

Figures released exclusively to The PIE News reveal the conversion rate of working holidaymakers to international student visa holders in Australia after they had returned home.

Statistical information released by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection shows 4,642 former working holidaymakers were granted a student visa while outside Australia.

Combined with onshore visa conversions, some 13,000 people whose last held visa was under the Working Holiday Maker Program – either a subclass Working Holiday visa (subclass 417) or Work and Holiday visa (subclass 462) – were granted a student visa in 2014/15.

Working holidaymakers represented around 4.4% of total international student visas granted during the same period, placing this conversion group above South Korea as Australia’s third highest channel for onshore enrolments.

The new data, which is not included in DIBP’s statistical reporting, was given special clearance for publication by The PIE News as part of an upcoming feature on working holiday visas in Australia and the US in The PIE Review.

According to a department spokesperson, this is the first time this information has been made publicly available.

Number of former working holidaymakers who were granted a student visa while outside Australia

Source: Department of Immigration and Border Protection, 2016 (BE9936.01) 

Of the participants in Australia’s two 12-month working holiday visa schemes to promote cultural exchange to 18-30-year-olds, DIBP previously only reported on those who continued directly onto a student visa while still in Australia.

With the addition of offshore data, the role Australia’s working holidaymaker visas play into the country’s international education industry is made clear.

International Education Association of Australia CEO Phil Honeywood said working holiday visas provide more benefit than what was indicated in the statistics.

“Anybody involved in international education would argue this provides wonderful soft diplomacy and other benefits,” he said.

“Anybody involved in international education would argue this provides wonderful soft diplomacy and other benefits”

Highlighting the visas’ allowance for up to four months’ study, he said: “There’s also a word-of-mouth benefit where these young people return home and talk about the fact they did an English language course. It would surely assist Australian education providers to advertise to other young people who are thinking of which country to go study in.”

Trends between the data sets appear to correspond with each other, as both onshore and offshore student visa numbers grew from the previous year.

VET attracted the most converted students, based on the data, representing 58.7% of offshore visas and two thirds of all visas granted to the visa subclasses.

According to Australian Council of Private Education and Training CEO Rod Camm, this trend may be due to working holidaymakers using VET providers to skill up for hospitality jobs, such as bartending or working as a barista.

“They have their working holiday, they do their short course, they like what they see so they come back and genuinely study,” suggested Camm.

While the new data improves the understanding of how Australia’s other visa frameworks assist its international education sector, offshore data for other visa classes is still not publicly available.

More information on the working holiday visa system in both Australia and the US, as well as how it feeds into the international education sector, will be available in the upcoming issue of The PIE Review.

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