Only UK’s top-performing universities should sponsor international students – Report 

A new report from the think-tank, Onward, has proposed a radical overhaul of the UK’s higher education system.

The report recommends that only top-performing universities should be eligible to sponsor international students and receive public subsidies, while others would be redirected to provide skills training. This means reducing the number of institutions authorized to issue visas, prioritizing those with the highest Ucas tariff scores.

This restructuring, endorsed by former Downing Street Chief of Staff, Nick Timothy, and former Education Secretary, Michael Gove, aims to address Britain’s economic challenges.

It also recommends limiting dependants to those studying funded PhDs and eliminating the graduate visa, encouraging international graduates to apply for skilled worker visas instead.

The debate over immigration in the UK has entangled international students’ recruitment, with restrictions such as the ban on master’s students bringing dependants contributing to a decline in international students numbers this year.

This downturn has triggered cost-cutting measures across the sector. As the issue gains further attention in anticipation of an upcoming general election by January 2025, leaked Home Office figures reported by the Daily Mail reveal a significant increase in asylum claims from individuals on student visas.

• What the Onward report advocates  

The Onward report advocates various reforms such as:

• A reform of post-18 education to reduce dependence on overseas students’ income. Others are:
• Shifting towards technical, vocational, and applied education, with increased public funding for apprenticeships.
• Emphasizing the correlation between institution quality and graduates’ lifetime earnings prospects. The report suggests that only universities with high Ucas tariffs should receive public subsidies for all courses.
• Lower-quality universities should be transformed into technical and vocational institutes offering value-added courses.
• While acknowledging universities’ autonomy in course offerings, the report asserts that the government should not finance ineligible courses through loans or public funding.

This proposal reflects a desire within certain factions of the Conservative Party to control student visa numbers and achieve a sustainable level of net migration, particularly in anticipation of the upcoming report from the Migration Advisory Committee the Migration Advisory Committee report.