Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Aberdeen City Council Investigates Economic Impact of International Students

During my research efforts I came across a very interesting document and the type that I have never seen before in the field of international education. The Economic Impact of International Students in Aberdeen City: Aberdeen City Council Briefing Paper 2008/03 is quite interesting in that it is the first time that I’m aware of where a city has investigated the impact of international students studying within its boundaries. The Aberdeen City Council, at the request of the Migrant Worker Action Plan Working Group, investigated the economic impact of international students on the city and considered the number of international graduates that remain in the city upon conclusion of their studies “by examining issues and challenges that need to be considered when predicting future trends in international student numbers.” You can access the Aberdeen City briefing paper here.

3 comments:

  1. Hi David.

    Some other examples of this sort of city-focussed study are listed in the IDP Database of Research on International Education (see list below), including one for my home town, Dunedin, noted when I was home on holiday and it was mentioned in the local paper. Typically these things are hard to find out about, keeping up with what Federal and State governments release is one thing, tracking local government reports is a bit harder... State-level economic impact studies seem more common (or easier to find).

    Anyway, here are some examples:
    Brisbane - city of education : the economic impact of international students. (2004 and 2007)
    The economic impact of London's international students. (2007)
    Report : international student spending. Dunedin: Dunedin City Council. (2004)
    International students : economic benefits for Auckland city. (2003)
    International students : their impact on Auckland city. (2003)
    Vancouver's English language school sector. (2003)
    A report on the demographic, social and economic impact of international students on North Shore City [Auckland]. (2002)
    The economic impact of the overseas student industry : special reference to the Wollongong economy. (1998)
    Domestic economic impact of exporting education : a case study of the University of Wollongong. (1995)

    Source: http://www.idp.com/research/database_of_research.aspx

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  2. @Stuart Hughes ~ Many thanks, Stuart, for taking the time to post your very informative comment on similar city-focused studies. I'm finding this research trend to be very interesting and plan to blog more about this in the future and will be sure to point out the studies you mention here and that they citations can be found in the IDP Database of Research on International Education. Best, David

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  3. @Stuart Hughes ~ I found another IHEC Blog post on this topic: "Manitoba’s International Education Strategy" at http://tinyurl.com/mv4q4b

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