Natalia Viktorivna Rybina
Candidate of Philological Sciences,
Associate Professor
TRENDS IN THE INTERNATIONAL HIGHER EDUCATION MARKET AND THE CURRENT STATE OF EXPORTS OF NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL SERVICES: KEY TRENDS AND GLOBALIZATION CHALLENGES
Trends in the International Education Market and the Current State of Higher Education Service Exports in Ukraine. In the context of global processes of education internationalization, one of the promising directions for the development of the domestic education sector is a focus on building and effectively realizing export potential and, based on this, further integration into the global education landscape. The main motivation for exporting educational services is to generate significant revenue and foster economic development. The international higher education market is valued at approximately $100 billion. According to UNESCO, higher education institutions from over 140 countries are present in the global market for educational services. According to statistics, an international student spends approximately one-fifth of their expenses in the host country on tuition, and four-fifths on housing, food, entertainment, and other costs.
In the United States, higher education is the fifth-largest export category in the American economy by value, sometimes exceeding revenue from arms exports. In Australia, the education sector is the third-largest source of budget revenue for the country’s economy. In 2014, the Canadian government recognized international education as a key factor in creating new jobs and improving well-being, and plans to double the number of international students to 450,000 by 2022. This will lead to an increase in spending by international students in the country to $16.1 billion and will create at least 86,500 new jobs in Canada [1].
Ukrainian universities have sufficient potential to compete for a share of the educational services market. According to data from the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, 65,000 students from 146 countries are enrolled in 187 Ukrainian universities. Ukraine’s share of the international education market, measured by the number of international students, stands at 1.5%. In recent years, the number of international students has increased significantly. Financial revenue from them in 2012–2013 amounted to 4.3 billion hryvnias. Universities with a significant proportion of international students receive substantial revenue. For example, in the 2012–13 academic year, Kharkiv National University of Radio Electronics received 40% of its budget from foreign students enrolled on a fee-paying basis. Providing educational services to foreign citizens in the 2012–2013 academic year helped secure employment for 5,000 faculty members. Foreign students are attracted to Ukrainian education by the relatively low cost of tuition and living expenses, the strength of certain academic disciplines (our physics, mathematics, and chemistry programs are recognized worldwide), and the long-standing reputation of leading Ukrainian universities. To adequately assess the competitive advantages or disadvantages of Ukrainian education, it is necessary, first and foremost, to analyze the demands of the global market.
Monitoring of student preferences shows that business education is most highly valued on the international market. Nearly 20% of students study technical and engineering sciences, with information technology being the most popular field. Roughly the same number of students choose the natural sciences. Medicine brings up the rear at 4–5%. In contrast, in Ukraine, 25% (over 16,000) of international students are pursuing medical studies. And 20% (over 13,000) are studying technical sciences.
The humanities and economics departments at Ukrainian universities are less popular among international students. When considering the geographic origin of applicants, the largest group (50%) of students in Ukraine comes from Asia: Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, China, the Russian Federation, India, Iraq, Iran, and others. From the African continent, a significant number of students come from Nigeria. More than 4,000 international students represent European countries. The reason why few international students from developed countries come to study in Ukraine is the relatively low standing of Ukrainian universities in international rankings, which determine the quality of education. In 2014, the number of international students decreased due to the events in Ukraine. For example, the number of first-year students admitted to Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University was 20 times lower than in 2013.
In the future, it will be necessary to intensify outreach efforts abroad to convince potential students that studying in Ukraine is safe. For Ukrainian higher education, expanding the export of educational services is beneficial, first, from an economic standpoint: training specialists for foreign countries is becoming one of the most profitable sources of revenue, especially given the lack of funding in the education sector. Second, from the perspective of improving the quality of education: the desire to attract international students encourages Ukrainian universities to develop a system for training specialists that takes into account the global labor market’s requirements regarding the quality of education and the fields of study.