Internationalisation. Home. Overseas. Both

1. Internationalisation:
At home? Overseas?
Or both?
• Steve Phillips
• Chair – English UK
• Managing Director Transnational Education
British Study Centres

2. There are two types of internationalisation
of education that run in parallel:
internationalisation at home and
internationalisation abroad,
or transnational education

3. 1. Context
2. Transnational Education (TNE)
3. Internationalise overseas
4. Internationalise at home
5. Business models, and associated risks
6. BSC: an overseas case study
7. DIT report findings, any barriers?
8. The B-word

4. Context
English Language industry UK statistics
(bad news)
• 1.5 million Student Weeks in 2006
• 2.2 million Student Weeks in 2011
• 1.5 million Student Weeks in 2016
• Largest decreases from Japan, South Korea,
Spain, Colombia, Brazil, and Russia
Source: English UK Statistics reports (various)

5. Context
International Student Mobility (good news)
Growth rate 2012 - 2015
Ireland 42%
New Zealand 39%
Canada 27%
USA 22%
Australia 18%
Germany 16%
UK 0.7%
Source: UUKi, Little known facts about international student mobility

6. Transnational
Education (TNE)
• ‘The provision of a higher education degree programme
leading to a UK qualification for students based in a
country other than the one in which the awarding
institution is located. This includes joint, double or dual
awards’ (Universities UK definition)
• ‘Transnational education (TNE) is education delivered in
a country other than the country in which the provider is
based’ (SP definition)

7. Transnational
Education (TNE)
• University of Nottingham - Malaysia Campus opened in
September 2000. It was the first ever branch campus of
a British University established outside the UK - earning
the distinction of the Queen's Award for Enterprise 2001
• Now: 4 in 5 UK Higher Education providers deliver
overseas
• There are currently 1.6 times as many students studying
UK Higher education awards overseas than there are
international students at universities in the UK
Source: The Scale and Scope of UK Higher Education
Transnational Education. June 2016 (HE Global)

8. • The top 5 countries that UK TNE is delivered in have
remained constant since 2012/13:
1. Malaysia
2. Singapore
3. Hong Kong
4. China
5. Oman

9. • There are only 15 countries in the world where the UK
does not offer any Higher education TNE
• There has been around 10 years of growth for UK TNE.
The growth rate between 2013/14 and 2014/15 was 13%
• One third of UK international students for undergraduate
studies come through TNE
• 50% of Chinese students currently in the UK came through
TNE

10. TNE strategic
overview:
higher
education
• Almost all higher education institutions (HEIs) plan
to increase the number of TNE programmes,
subjects, countries and students according to four
out of five HEIs (80%). This suggests that the
appetite for UK TNE is not plateauing, and overseas
markets are not saturated.

11. TNE strategic
overview
(HEIs)
• In terms of organisational and management related
issues, UK institutions are predominantly
responsible for:
curriculum development, quality assurance,
assessment, teaching, staff development
• Host institutions are responsible for:
learning resources, buildings and infrastructure,
pastoral support and academic support.

12. TNE strategic
overview
(HEIs)
The main drivers for TNE provision are:
I. Increasing student numbers
II. Increasing institutional reputation
III. Increasing income

13. Internationalise
overseas
• BC reported that global mobility of tertiary aged
students is due to increase annually by 1.7% between
2015 and 2027
• This represents a decrease from the growth of 5.7% that
was experienced between 2000 and 2015
(from British Council January 2018 -
International students mobility to 2027: Local investment,
global outcomes)

14. Internationalise
overseas
• Governments’ national language policies and
internationalisation strategies:
Examples: Vietnam MoET National Foreign Language
2020 Project, Colombia, Kyrgyzstan
• Countries keen to become education hubs
Sri Lanka to establish itself as an education hub in
Asia, trading on its strategic location, tourism appeal
and significant development planned – which includes
a GBP £1bn ambitious port city project, funded by
Chinese investment.
Turkey, from 140,000 to 350,000 international
students in the next 7 years, government backed
initiative

15. Internationalise
at home
• After 3 years of consecutive downturn, 2017 saw a
rebound by the UK ELT industry.
• An increase of 14% of student numbers from 2016
• An increase of 5% of student weeks
• London & Scotland were the biggest gainers percentage-
wise, both enjoying 11% growth from 2016
• Markets outside the EU generated 63% of all student
weeks, while contributing 42% of students
• Under 18s: 10 years ago represented 25% of the UK ELT
market (students not SWs)– now 53%
Source: English UK – Student Statistics Report 05/2018

16. Internationalise
at home
Signs of a recovery (student marketing 2018)
• USA developments (helping other destinations)
• Pound exchange rates helping the UK
• More innovation
• Destination promotion
• More opportunities for UK junior market

17. Internationalise
at home
2018 ICEF i-graduate Agent Barometer results
Responses from 1,300 agents in 101 countries
• The vast majority of agents responding to the 2018
survey – between 74% and 84% for most programme
categories – said that they expect to place more students
in the next 12 months than in the previous year
The chart on the next slide maps changes in the reported
attractiveness of major English-speaking study destinations
between the 2014 and 2018 surveys.

18. Trends in overall attractiveness for leading English-speaking study destinations. Source: i-graduate/ICEF

19. Overseas business models
There is ‘no one size fits all’ as far as TNE programmes are concerned - there is great diversity to
delivery models
UK universities have started to move into a different type of engagement, with
partnerships at the centre. There has been a trend towards more partnership-led models.

20. Overseas business models
• Physical presence - branch campuses
• Flying faculty
• mixed models
• Distance/online learning e.g. either with or without local support
• Local delivery partnerships e.g. franchised delivery
• joint and dual degrees, twinning arrangements
• validation and quality arrangements

21. Business
models:
partnership
opportunities
Language learning models: requests for the BSC TNE team,
last 24 months:
• Brand licensing
• Franchising
• Joint Ventures
• Teacher Training partnerships
• Curriculum sharing
• Certification services
• School purchases
• Start-ups
• Accreditation services

22. Associated risks
RISK OF REPUTATIONAL
DAMAGE
TRAPPED CASH RISK OF MARKET
FAILURE
QUALITY RISK

23. BSC Algeria
case study
• Franchise model – local ownership
• Based in Oran, Algeria’s 2nd largest city
• Opened summer 2017
• Taught over 500 students in the first year
• Director of Studies is UK national (TEFLQ)
• Advantages & Disadvantages

24. The barriers to delivering English
Language teaching overseas
Ipsos MORI research for the
Department for International Trade
(DIT) 2018
.

25. Delivering education projects overseas remains a key
priority for UK Government and the research is to
understand the capacity of the UK English language
teaching industry to deliver overseas, and how UK
Government can support in expanding provision
.

26. The specific
objectives
were to:
I. Examine current English language teaching provision
that is delivered overseas by UK providers
II. Gauge the potential for expanding provision of English
language teaching overseas
III. Understand the barriers to providing teaching
overseas
IV. Explore how government can support centres to
overcome these barriers

27. Report
findings
• Provision of English Language teaching overseas was low.
One in five centres (21%) were currently delivering
courses or activities overseas, but over three-quarters
(79%) were not
• Two key reasons for choosing to deliver overseas:
I. demand from students
II. to grow or expand the business

28. Report
findings
• Centres were aware of the potential opportunities for
delivering overseas
• Centres had been approached by students, agents,
businesses and schools based overseas, with regards to
business proposals and/or requests to form partnerships
• Centres that were currently delivering overseas (or were
interested in doing so) perceived overseas delivery to be
a growing market and wanted to expand their current
provision.

29. Report
findings
• At the same time, centres had experienced a reduced or
stagnated demand for delivering courses in the UK. This
was felt to be caused by stricter immigration and visa
rules and by a growing preference for shorter or online
courses, or courses offered locally.
• Shrinking demand in the UK forced some centres to
pursue overseas delivery as a means of economic
‘survival’.

30. Report
findings
• Centres preferred to use local partners for ease and
access
• Local delivery partners were a popular choice of delivery
mode, as they offered quicker and easier routes to
market, at a fraction of the cost of setting up physical
presence.
• These partnerships also offered additional benefits, such
as knowledge of local cultures and languages and
guidance on essential administrative processes. Using
foreign delivery partnerships also omitted barriers such
as the need to obtain licenses or visas to send UK staff
aboard.
• Smaller centres struggled with competition from larger
chains, which had existing, long-standing networks in big
cities across the globe. This made it harder for them to
access foreign delivery partners in an affordable way.

31. Research highlights:
• Half of centres had received enquiries to deliver
teaching overseas, mainly from Asia, Europe, and
the Middle East
• These enquiries were usually about English
language teaching, teacher training, or preparation
for academic studies
• The difficulty of finding potential partners in target
markets was the biggest perceived barrier to
delivering teaching overseas (37%)

32. The B-word

33. The B-word
In 2016 English UK polled members about their opinions on
the potential business impact of the referendum:
• Over 75% of member centres believe remaining in the EU
is best for business
• 77% said that leaving the EU would be “bad” or “very
bad” for business.
• 6% of members thought leaving the EU would have a
positive effect on their business.

34. The B-word
Hot off the press: excerpts from evidence given by the
Immigration Minister to the Home Affairs Select Committee
(October 2018)
I. I think it is really important that as part of a future
mobility framework, we continue to work closely with
the EU and individual member states, to ensure that
going forward we can have a reciprocal arrangement
where EU citizens can continue to travel here for short-
term visits for up to three months
Caroline Nokes: Minister of State for Immigration

35. The B-word
I. EEA passengers still can, will be able to and do use
their identity cards. I have to say that that is not my
preference. I wish everybody would travel on a
biometric passport. Those EU citizens who use them
currently will still be entitled to use them post Brexit
as part of the citizens’ rights agreement that we
reached with the EU up until 2025, which gives them
plenty of time to plan to have a biometric passport
Caroline Nokes: Minister of State for Immigration

36. A final thought:
Culture eats strategy for breakfast!

37. ‘Speed now, fair guests!’ she said ‘And
hold to your purpose!’
‘A blessing on your footsteps and make
haste while the sun shines!’
Goldberry from Lord of the Rings
J.R.R Tolkien 1954

38. Thank you