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Changing landscape of international student mobility

by Hans de Wit, Philip G Altbach and Lizhou Wang

In its many diverse forms – including degree study, credit earning, branch campuses, and others – mobility remains a major aspect of international higher education. But mobility patterns are shifting. While the South-North movement remains primary at the world level, new patterns and modes are emerging. This blog describes these new patterns and their rationales. It is based on our chapter ‘International student mobility in a changing global environment: key issues and trends’, in: Simon Marginson, Catherine Montgomery, Alain Courtois and Ravinder Sidhu (eds), The Future of Cross Border Academic Mobilities and Immobilities: Power, Knowledge and Agency, published by Bloomsbury.

Notably, student and scholar mobility has become a mass enterprise, with more than six million students studying outside their countries in 2021 (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2024). But, although global student mobility is a significant factor and at the core of internationalisation efforts, it is limited to a small and mainly elite sector of the global student population. Six million global students represent a small proportion of the 254 million students pursuing higher education worldwide. Nevertheless, the mobility of learners, teachers, and scholars has always been a key dimension of higher education.

‘Internationally mobile students’ often refers to degree-mobile students who move to a foreign country for educational purposes and receive a foreign tertiary/higher education degree on a student visa. The predominant pattern of degree mobility at the world level has been from the Global South to the Global North, although there is also significant degree mobility within the Global North, in particular within Europe, and from the United States to Europe, as well as the reverse. Initially, the South to North flow consisted largely of small numbers of elites from colonies to the imperial countries. This movement increased significantly after independence, for example, students travelling to the UK and France. This kind of mobility also extended to other key Anglophone countries, including the United States, Canada, and Australia, which have maintained a dominant destination position. On the supply side, the fastest growth in outgoing students has been from Global South countries. From 1995 to 2010, the main sending countries worldwide were China, India, and Malaysia.

Shifting mobility patterns

While South-to-North and, to some extent, North-to-North mobility remain numerically dominant, there is a trend towards multipolarity and intra-regional student mobility. According to Van Mol et al (in E Recchi and M Safi (eds), (2024) Handbook of Human Mobility and Migration (pp 128–47). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishers), the past fifteen years have witnessed a challenge to the hegemony of the Anglo-Saxon and Western countries, with new educational hubs gaining prominence. A more diverse set of countries now exerts greater relative influence in the overall student mobility network.

In particular, intra-regional mobility is growing in the South, from low-income towards middle-income countries. For China, the top senders are neighbours South Korea, Thailand, and Pakistan. For Russia, the top senders are nearby Kazakhstan, China, and Uzbekistan. Likewise, South Korea and Japan have become top study destinations for students from Vietnam, Indonesia, and Malaysia. For Argentina, all the top sending countries are also from South America: Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Paraguay, and Bolivia. Interestingly, some of the sending countries present themselves as new destinations, for instance, Kazakhstan and Vietnam. What drives these changes?

Macro-level drivers for international mobility

In the dynamic landscape of international higher education, macro-level factors, beyond the control of individual countries, higher education institutions (HEIs), and students, wield significant influence in changing mobility patterns. In many sending countries, the enhancement in higher education quality, along with economic development, plays an important role. For example, in East Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea, the national higher education systems have now achieved excellent quality and become attractive study destinations for international students. And other countries follow.

Economic and financial considerations

Another global factor shaping the mobility landscape is the increasing commodification of education. Anglophone high-income countries have particularly benefited financially from this market. For example, in the academic year 2022–3, over one million international students at US colleges and universities contributed more than $40 billion to the US economy and supported more than 368,000 jobs (NAFSA, 2023). For the UK, the figure for the total economic contribution was £41.9 billion in the 2021/2 academic year (Higher Education Policy Institute, 2023).

At the same time, high living and tuition costs, coupled with increased xenophobia and visa and other restrictions in the Global North, have driven many students from the South to pursue education in non-Western nations where tuition and living costs are less expensive. These economic pull factors make the emerging study destinations attractive to many international students, especially those from middle-income and lower-income families.

Soft power and cultural influences

Many countries and institutions prioritise international student recruitment as a key target in their strategies for the internationalisation of higher education because of the value they place on securing soft power, cross-border cultural influence, and improved university rankings.

At the national level, countries utilise strategic policies and national agencies to promote international student recruitment and subsidize inbound mobility. Activities and initiatives involve various national actors that aim to build a comprehensive ecosystem in supporting immigration regulation, university cooperation, language training, and scholarships. Examples include the Indian government, which launched the Study in India flagship project in 2018 in collaboration with various government departments to enhance its global identity through international education initiatives. Similarly, the Education Plan in China’s Belt and Road Initiative showcases the political and diplomatic motivations behind its internationalisation strategy and international student recruitment.

Demographic change, labour market, and migration

For many countries in the Global North, significant demographic decline and the need for skilled labour have made it challenging to find sufficient talent domestically. Attracting talented international students, faculty, and professionals, as well as encouraging student retention, are often crucial strategies for higher education in high-income and middle-income countries.

Important in the above-mentioned factors are the many ways in which migration and student mobility cross over. Education functions as a significant migration doorway for a large minority of students moving from the Global South to the Anglophone countries. Tensions and controversies arise regarding international students’ post-study options, labour market needs, and immigration policies.

Complex and multilayered

In the words of Van Mol et al (2024, p141), international student mobility is ‘complex and multilayered’. It is influenced by a variety of changing contexts and related push and pull factors. There is no such archetype as ‘the international student’, as there are different forms of student, stakeholder roles, and motivations for mobility. In degree mobility, one can observe a gradual shift from a predominantly South-North movement towards a more diverse movement, with dominant sending countries, particularly in Asia, increasingly becoming receiving countries.

Revenue generation remains a dominant pull factor in the Anglophone higher education sector. Another key consideration is increasing the stay rate of international students so as to better meet skilled labour needs.

At the same time, geopolitical tensions, national security concerns, and nationalist anti-immigration sentiments and policies are becoming important obstacles to international student mobility. While international students and the revenues they generate are important in a few countries, perhaps more important to the global economy as a whole are patterns of high-skilled immigration related to student mobility. These patterns contribute to inequalities, impact remittances, influence scientific collaboration, and affect many other factors in numerous countries.

As countries navigate these complex dynamics, the strategic management of international student flows and integration of skilled graduates into the labour market will be crucial for maximising the benefits of global education and fostering international collaboration. Ultimately, understanding the evolving nature of international student mobility is essential for policymakers and educators who seek to enhance the internationalisation of higher education and address the broader challenges and opportunities it presents.

Hans de Wit is Emeritus Professor and Distinguished Fellow of the ‘Center for International Higher Education’ (CIHE) at Boston College. He is IAU Senior Fellow in the International Association of Universities (IAU) and Co-Editor of Policy Reviews in Higher Education (SRHE).

Philip G Altbach is Research Professor and Distinguished Fellow at the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College, where from 1994 to 2015 he was the Monan University Professor.

Lizhou Wang is an Assistant Professor at the Waseda Institute for Advanced Study, Waseda University, Japan. Lizhou conducts research on the internationalisation of higher education, including international mobility and research collaboration.


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Studying abroad at home: why Korean students are choosing US branch campuses in Korea

by Kyuseok Kim

In South Korea, education has long been the most powerful route to social mobility and prestige, but a recent study shows how that pursuit is changing. Published in the Asia Pacific Education Review (2025), one of the newest article in transnational education (TNE) research investigates why Korean students are now choosing to study at US branch campuses located inside their own country rather than traveling abroad. Focusing on N University, a US-affiliated institution within the Incheon Global Campus, the study explores how students balance ambition, constraint, and identity in one of the world’s most competitive education systems.

Korea’s higher education landscape is characterised by rigid hierarchies in which the name of a university often outweighs individual academic or professional ability. Admission to elite institutions such as Seoul National, Korea, and Yonsei University is still viewed as a ticket to success. At the same time, US degrees continue to hold exceptional symbolic power, representing international competence, social status, and career advantage. Yet, for many families, studying abroad is prohibitively expensive, while competition for domestic university places remains intense. The result is that a growing number of students are enrolling in American branch campuses at home, institutions that promise the prestige of a US education without the cost and distance of overseas study.

To explain this trend, the researchers propose a Trilateral Push–Pull Model. Traditional models of student mobility describe decision-making as a process between two countries or schools: one that pushes students out and another that pulls them in. However, international branch campuses (IBCs) add a third dimension. Korean universities push students away through limited access and rigid hierarchies. US universities attract them with prestige and global capital but are often out of reach financially and logistically. The IBC exists between these poles, offering an American degree and English-language instruction within Korea’s borders. This framework captures how students navigate overlapping pressures from domestic and global systems.

Drawing on interviews with 21 Korean students, the study reveals several interconnected findings. Many participants viewed the IBC as a second choice, not their first preference but a realistic and strategic option when other routes were blocked. They were attracted by the prestige of American degree, USstyle curriculum (in English), smaller classes, and opportunities for studying at the home campus abroad. At the same time, they expressed anxiety about the ambiguous status of their institution. Several students described N University as “in between”, uncertain whether it was truly American or fully Korean. This ambiguity, they said, made it difficult to explain their school to relatives, peers, or teachers, who were unfamiliar with the branch campus model. In a culture where school reputation carries great weight, such uncertainty caused unease even when students were satisfied with their learning experience.

The study also underscores the continuing role of family influence and educational aspiration. Many students reported growing up in households where parents believed education was the only reliable path to success and were willing to make sacrifices for English proficiency and global exposure. For these families, IBCs offered a middle ground: a way to obtain a foreign education without leaving home or paying international tuition. Students who attended Korean secondary schools typically saw the IBC as an alternative after failing to gain admission to top domestic universities. Those with international or bilingual school backgrounds viewed it as a substitute for studying abroad, particularly after the COVID-19 pandemic made overseas education less appealing or feasible.

In both groups, the IBC served as a strategic compromise. It allowed students to maintain a sense of global ambition while avoiding the financial, emotional, and logistical risks of full international mobility. It also provided a form of what sociologist Jongyoung Kim calls global cultural capital: the symbolic value and recognition that come with foreign credentials. By earning an American degree at home, students could claim global status without physically migrating. This pattern illustrates how globalisation in higher education is increasingly taking place within national borders.

Beyond individual motivations, the study connects these choices to larger demographic and policy challenges. Korea’s declining college-age population and government-imposed tuition freezes have created fierce competition among universities for a shrinking pool of students. In this environment, IBCs serve dual roles: they act as pressure valves that absorb unmet domestic demand and as prestige bridges that connect local students to the symbolic power of American education. However, their long-term sustainability remains uncertain. Many IBCs struggle with limited public visibility, uneven recognition, and questions about academic legitimacy. Unless they establish a clearer institutional identity and stronger integration within the local higher education system, they risk being viewed as peripheral rather than prestigious.

The research also broadens theoretical understanding of international education. By incorporating the IBC as a third actor in the push–pull framework, the study challenges the assumption that global learning always requires cross-border mobility. It also refines the concept of global cultural capital, showing that students can now accumulate globally valued credentials and symbolic advantage through domestic avenues. In countries like South Korea, where education is deeply tied to social status, this shift represents an important transformation. The global and the local are no longer opposites but increasingly intertwined within the same institutional spaces.

In conclusion, Korean students’ choices to enroll in US branch campuses reveal a strategic negotiation between aspiration and limitation. These institutions appeal not to those lacking ambition but to those who seek to reconcile global goals with financial and social realities. They reflect a world in which higher education is simultaneously global and local, mobile and immobile. For IBCs to thrive, they must move beyond copying Western models and instead cultivate programs that are meaningful in their local contexts while maintaining international quality.

This article summarizes the research findings from ‘Choosing a U.S. Branch Campus in Korea: A Case Study of Korean Students’ Decision-Making through the Trilateral Push–Pull Model’ by Kyuseok Kim, Hyunju Lee, and Kiyong Byun, published in the Asia Pacific Education Review (2025).

Kyuseok Kim is a PhD candidate at Korea University and a Centre Director of IES Seoul.


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Moving with the times: The growing need for better graduate mobility data

by Tej Nathwani

Introduction

As SRHE noted in their summary of the theme of the 2022 conference, one of the current areas of discussion is the relationship between student mobility and outcomes. For example, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) have used the Longitudinal Education Outcomes dataset to explore trends in graduate mobility and earnings in England. While mobility is correlated with individual destinations, there are also wider macroeconomic consequences resulting from the extent to which graduates move around the country.

In a separate paper by the Resolution Foundation and the Centre for Economic Performance, researchers at the two organisations highlighted how one of the key factors that explains variations in productivity across areas are human capital levels – measured by the share of graduates in the locality. Hence, while providers can help with widening participation and upskilling the labour force in our most deprived regions, the full benefits of this for the vicinity may only be realised if those individuals who study in higher education choose not to move out of the area or region. One of the consequences of this is that providers are increasingly working with employers to try and ensure graduates can utilise their skills in the local economy (for example at Sheffield Hallam).

Given the state of the UK economy and the role mobility may have on individuals and growth, this is a topic that will remain salient in forthcoming years. However, even before we think about the association between mobility and outcomes, the first question to consider is how data might help us to better understand the extent to which graduates move for study and/or work. Historically, exploration of graduate movements has been at a regional level, which has become less relevant and valuable at a time when interest also lies in inequalities within regions, as well as between them. This blog will thus focus on a new marker HESA has generated to help our users gain more detailed insights into mobility.

The current problem

Patterns of regional migration and the categorisation of graduates into different groups based on this was first explored by Prospects back in the mid-2000s. One of the limitations of using such an aggregated level of geography, however, is that Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are all classified as individual regions. This means we are unable to examine what mobility is like within these nations. To see the drawbacks for investigating mobility in England using region, consider the neighbouring areas of Bradford and Leeds – both of which are within Yorkshire and The Humber. As the ONS regional economic activity data illustrates, there has been a divergence in the economic performance of these two places over the last twenty years. Hence, a graduate originally from Bradford who studies at the local university, but then moves for work to Leeds would be allocated to the same group in a regional analysis as one who initially lives, studies and is then employed in Bradford. With the graduate share being a key factor in understanding the differences in economic performance between areas, the possibility of distinguishing between graduates who remain in areas of low economic activity and those who move out of such localities for work is growing in importance.

A potential solution

HESA collect the postcode at which the individual resides prior to starting higher education and also request similar data from the graduate in the Graduate Outcomes survey regarding their location of employment (if they don’t know the postcode for their employment location, we ask the graduate to provide the town/city/area in which they work). There is therefore the potential to map these postcodes to local authority data (and their equivalents in Scotland and Northern Ireland). Using local authority of residence/work and region of study, we have created a mobility marker consisting of the following seven categories:

  1. Stays in same region for study and finds work in the same local authority as original location of residence
  2. Returns to the same local authority for work as original location of residence, having left region/country for study
  3. Stays in same region for study, but finds work in different local authority (in the same region) to original location of residence
  4. Returns to a different local authority (of the same region) for work when compared with original location of residence, having moved region/country for study
  5. Moved region/country for work, but did not move region for study
  6. Moved region/country for study, but did not then move region/country again for work
  7. Moved region/country for study and then moved region/country again for work (with the region/country being different to their original region/country of residence)

Going back to our original example of the two graduates from Bradford (one who moves for work and one who doesn’t), this new classification ensures they are no longer placed in the same group. Rather, one is allocated to category A, while the other is assigned to C. Such distinctions will help improve our awareness of overall patterns of mobility across time.

Concluding thoughts

Our initial exploration into mobility and job quality suggests that migrating for employment is correlated with graduates finding a role that fits better with their career plans. With similar findings on the benefits of moving for work from a salary perspective also being reported by the IFS, this could potentially leave those aiming to reduce disparities in economic performance between areas with a conundrum. Policies aiming to upskill the labour force in more deprived areas and help reduce spatial inequalities require these individuals to remain in such neighbourhoods. Yet current evidence suggests that moving for work is associated with more positive outcomes for these people. Given the relevance to policy aims, as we continue to collect increasing amount of data on graduates through our annual Graduate Outcomes survey, we shall be exploring the potential to map how mobility differs by area (eg by investigating whether we have adequate sample size at more granular levels of geography). If this does prove feasible, this will help end users with ascertaining the extent to which localities with lower output are gaining/losing graduates.

High levels of inequality and poor growth are two key concerns for the UK economy. We hope that the development of new measures on deprivation and graduate mobility can help the higher education sector with tackling these issues and assist providers in capturing the wider impact they are making in society.

Feedback on our mobility marker is most welcome. Please send these to pressoffice@hesa.ac.uk.

To learn more about Graduate Outcomes, visit www.graduateoutcomes.ac.uk or view the latest national level official statistics.

To be kept updated on our publication plans and latest research releases, please join our mailing list.

Tej Nathwani is a Principal Researcher (Economist) at HESA, which is now part of Jisc.