Historically speaking, the United Kingdom was one of the most active countries in sending overseas students. It was also one of the first to achieve the feat of exceeding 500,000 students in its universities. This has been a real success story, according to Universities UK CEO Vivienne Stern.
There are a number of reasons why the UK’s student population has grown in recent years. One of the main factors may be the government’s new International Education Strategy (IES), which was published last year. This new strategy recognises the challenges associated with COVID and charts the sector’s recovery path. It will also make use of the information collected by relevant non-governmental organisations in a wide range of documents that give evidence to select committees.
There are two areas of interest to be considered in the study of study abroad in the UK: the role of the host country and the role of the sender. The former has been the subject of much secondary literature, while the latter has been a bit more elusive. This article will consider the latter. In terms of sending students abroad, it is clear that the UK had a role to play, although it did not have a large impact. This may be due to the logistical challenges involved in a journey to Nigeria, for example.
It is also clear that the FRG had a role to play in supplying foreign students to the UK. The FRG’s role in supplying study abroad students to the UK was far more significant than its role in supplying students to France. For example, while France was the largest recipient of UK students in 1978 with 2350 students, the FRG sent more students to the UK than the UK sent to France.
Although Britain was a global power, it was a post-imperial power with a well-developed connection to the EEC. The British Council facilitated Commonwealth scholars in the post-war period. It was also the first country to establish a formal network of study abroad. Despite this, the British government did not recognise the importance of the phenomenon until the late 1970s. It was only in the early 1990s that the UK government recognised the need to improve its international reputation, and subsequently launched a major revamp of its International Education Strategy.
The Overseas Students Trust was founded in the 1960s as a non-governmental organisation to campaign for the benefits of overseas student mobility in Britain. The Overseas Students Trust’s research into student mobility identified several factors limiting UK government policy. These included political factors, such as the role of the Catholic church in the British education system, as well as economic factors, such as the high cost of living. In the post-war period, the Conservative government was particularly keen to promote political freedoms and human rights. The Overseas Students Trust’s work was also prompted by the need to understand the UK’s contribution to the global educational system. The Overseas Students Trust studied three large European countries.