CANBERRA – The approval rates for Australian student visa applicants have gone down for the first time in years, signifying the impact of the policies implemented recently.
Official data from the Australian government reveals that the approval rate for student visa applications remained consistently above 90% from 2006 to 2022.
Nonetheless, there was a decline noted, dropping to 86% for the academic year 2021-2022, followed by a further decrease to a record low of 81.5% for the period spanning 2023-2024.
In line with these approval rates, estimates suggest that there would be 90,000 fewer students in the country this year as compared to the previous year.
The government of Australia welcomed students in large numbers. For instance, in the 2022-23 timeframe, Australia saw an influx of more than 510,000 migrants, among whom were 270,000 international students, marking a substantial increase from the pre-pandemic figure of 170,000 international students documented in 2018-2019, vnexpress reported.
The influx of students triggered a housing crisis, prompting the authorities to say that the system was broken and highlighting the measures needed to curb this.
The approval rates seem to be the direct result of a number of measures taken by the government including restrictions on student work hours to less than 48 per fortnight and a requirement for students to demonstrate savings of AU$24,000 before obtaining a visa.
Moreover, the government also discouraged students from changing from a high-cost to a low-cost college within their first six months in Australia.
The visa approval rates might go down further as Australia will adjust its post-study work rights policy for international students, reducing the duration international graduates can stay in the country for work purposes.
It bears mentioning that the government of Canada is also discouraging international students and has reduced their number by 35 percent as part of the fresh measures.
