UK universities in the past have had glorious time, attracting hundreds of international students, even when it failed to appeal to the local ones.
This government's immigration policies, that are aimed to cut down foreigners coming to this country, have finally resulted to what an economically recovering country must fear. It has raised concerns amongst university towns, now dreading similar consequences.
The University of South Wales (USW) opened-up its London doors in the Docklands in east London last year, relying on international students to fill its desks. But the university has now cited the government's recent toughening of visa regulations as being part of the reason they have had to shut their doors, after just one year - because it failed to attract any students.
The university is now being criticised for wasting money that could have been used to same some of the jobs of the 90 staff set to lose their jobs in Wales. The university employed four staff at the docklands and had rented the space instead of buying it.
In a statement to the South Wales Argus, the university said: “The university explored a 'proof of concept' exercise that involved a hosted-facilities arrangement for USW’s own staff to teach its part-time courses in a small, highly specialised range of professional disciplines. The arrangement allowed us to test the market without major financial outlay.
“We had a number of student applications but, having tested the market, USW decided not to proceed at this time. In part, the business case was based on recruiting international students.
“However, the UK visa regulations changed in between the decision to start the project and the point at which we would have moved to enroll students.”
For the first time in 30 years the number of international students enrolling in England's universities decreased. In 2013, there was a 50% drop in the number of postgraduate students coming from India and Pakistan, and close to a 25% drop in the number of students who enrolled from the EU compared with last year.
There are many satellite/small towns that economically depend on universities, especially on international students, who pay twice the amount of tuition fees than the local ones.
