US: International student admissions soar by 11%

The rates at which international students applied to - and were accepted by - US universities rose by 11% last year, the biggest surge since 2006, according to a new report from the Council of Graduate Schools.

China led the pack with a 23% growth in admissions offers and a 21% increase in applications to American universities, the sixth year in a row of substantial gains for China.

Trailing close behind was the Middle East and Turkey, with gains in both admissions offers and applications of 16% in 2010, the fourth consecutive year of double-digit growth.

India saw an 8% increase in offers of admission and applications, the first gain since 2007. South Korea's admissions offers remained constant after four years of decline, and applications rose slightly, by 2%.

A third of the overall admissions offers were split between two unrelated fields, with 16% of new students enrolled in business while another 15% chose physical and earth sciences. Foreign students were least attracted by the so-called 'soft sciences', with only 3% choosing social sciences and psychology as degree areas.

Reasons for the total gains this year vary, and may be a reflection of the positive economic situation in some countries, Debra Stewart, President of the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), told University World News.

Stewart added that demand for graduate education and a global need for the training and skills that a US graduate education will provide, continued to drive the increase.

Overall, international enrollment in US graduate education has increased 3% to 4% each year on average over the past decade, a growth Stewart said was likely to continue. "[That] is a strong rate of increase, and there is no indication that these average increases will cease," she said.

International students are drawn to America's strong graduate programmes across a broad spectrum of fields, said Stewart.

"Until capacity for graduate education increases in China, continued growth in the numbers of students coming to the US is likely to occur," she added.

The same is true for India, at least for the time being. Admissions figures have fluctuated wildly over the past few years, even dropping by 12% in 2009. But the increase in applications and admissions for the past two years suggests a "renewed and increasing interest in US graduate education," Stewart said.

However, annual changes in the numbers of international graduate students coming to the US have a relatively small effect on the overall higher education landscape, commented Stewart.

Only about 15.5% of all graduate students in the US are international students, according to data from the annual CGS-GRE Survey of Graduate Enrollment and Degrees. So "annual gains that occur among international students result in relatively small shifts in the overall percentage of students who are international," she said.

By and large the increases in admissions took place at those universities that had a history of successful engagement with international students resulting in the completion of graduate degrees and the awarding of qualifications.

The report is the second part of a three-phase survey of CGS member institutions. The 241 American universities that responded to the survey represent 64% of the approximately 96,000 graduate degrees awarded to international students in the US from 2008 to 2009.