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Aussie varsities bow to Asian tiger mums

SYDNEY — Australian universities are learning from Asia’s tiger mums in a bid to address a sharp fall in overseas students, who are being lured to United States colleges where living and study costs are cheaper.

SYDNEY — Australian universities are learning from Asia’s tiger mums in a bid to address a sharp fall in overseas students, who are being lured to United States colleges where living and study costs are cheaper.

The new residential accommodation at the University of New South Wales in Sydney is designed with foreign students in mind. At the request of strict Asian parents, the days of college as an opportunity to work hard and play hard are fast being replaced by a new regime of alcohol-free dorms and gender-segregated floors. The university offers nightly bed checks for younger students to ensure they are in their rooms by 10pm — and alone.

“My mum’s happy about the fact that our apartments are under 24/7 campus security coverage,” said Mr Mike Lin, a 22-year-old from Fuzhou, in southern China, who is studying at the university. “I do think domestic students tend to party a bit much at university — they seem to enjoy the university life better than us.”

Faced with a decline in overseas interest, Australian universities are reshaping their programmes and accommodations to attract more students from the Asia-Pacific region.

Australian universities are upending the traditional college model to meet the standards of strict Asian parents. Residential dorms now offer prayer rooms and private en-suites.

Newly-built studio apartments gleam with hotel-style bathrooms and kitchenettes, the latest in IT technology and soundproof rooms for study groups, as well as 24-hour security and a telephone hotline for parents.

Nearly a third of all foreign students in Australia last year were from China. For years, Australian universities were more popular with students from China than US colleges. But Chinese student numbers peaked in 2010 and — more worryingly given Australia’s ambition to be at the heart of Asia — last year, more Chinese students chose to study in the US than Down Under.

A recent government paper found that it costs about A$44,000 (S$51,900) a year to study and live in Australia, which is A$7,000 more on average than in the US, and A$14,000 more than in the United Kingdom. Australia experienced a 12 per cent drop in international enrolments between 2010 and last year, official figures showed.

Australian business schools are also changing their coursework to reflect the country’s increasing ties with its Asian neighbours—with fewer case studies about American companies and more on Asian firms, where many of today’s graduates will find work. The University of Melbourne uses social networks such as Chinese microblogging service Weibo to connect students with former alumni who could be potential employers.

Foreign education is Australia’s fourth-largest export after commodities like iron ore and gold, generating about A$14.5 billion in export revenue annually. Since the financial crisis, though, universities in the US and Europe have stepped up competition for international students in response to government funding cuts.

Australia’s education industry has also been hit hard by a strong Australian dollar, which until recently had recorded its longest stretch above parity with the US greenback in three decades, making it more expensive to study here.

Slowing interest among international students is adding to the headache for Australia’s policymakers, as a mining boom that has powered the resource-rich economy for more than a decade slows. A recent survey of 1,000 mainland Chinese by HSBC ranked Australia as Asia’s top education destination. But it lagged the US, the UK and Canada globally. Singapore was its closest rival in Asia.

“Chinese consumers are unbelievably brand-conscious,” said Professor Geoffrey Garrett, Dean of the University of New South Wales’ Australian School of Business.

“If you’ve got a brand like UCLA or Berkeley, you’re probably going to be pretty attractive to aspire-high Chinese families and students. It works the same way as luxury retail. UCLA equals DKNY.” DOW JONES

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