Examining the impacts of visa policy changes on international student enrolment and mobility

Recent changes in international student visa regulations have fundamentally reshaped students’ decisions about where to study. UK Higher Education (HE) institutions have seen significant negative effects in international student recruitment resulting from both domestic policy shifts and those in the US, Canada and Australia. This paper applies a multi-country policy analysis, to examine the effects of these changes and takes a wider view of how international student enrolment trends and student study destination choices are shaped by visa regulations in the UK, US, Canada and Australia. The research findings reveal that that visa policy is increasingly becoming a primary determinant of international student mobility, often outweighing traditional push–pull factors and rapidly reshaping enrolment patterns across destination countries. Important implications are provided for HE institutions to improve international student recruitment and retention, and for international policymakers to consider when setting policy affecting HE recruitment.