Some international students, typically connected to Chinese residents or those of a Chinese background, have been caught cheating their way into the University of Sydney using fake secondary school diplomas and English-language tests, prompting the institution to consider stricter rules for Chinese nationals.
The University of Sydney detected a surge in fraudulent admissions last year, stemming mostly from Chinese international students. Edwina Pickles
An in 2022 as students returned after COVID-19 restrictions were lifted: more than 250 prospective or enrolled students submitted fraudulent applications, up from just 15 detections in 2021. So far this year, 53 fraudulent admissions have been detected, and more than a quarter of them were already enrolled students.
Australia’s universities have been forced to mainline on foreign students for nearly a decade since the federal government cut funding. Fee-paying students, particularly foreign students, fill the gap in their budgets. They now comprise almost a third of students undertaking higher education. According to education research site, there are 619,371 international students studying in Australia with 361,247 enrolled in higher education only. And 156,217 of the total intake comes from China. NSW, with 244,193, is the most popular destination. The University of Sydney has the among Australian universities: 38.2 per cent of the university’s 47,118 students come from overseas.
The University of Sydney report found many of the cases linked to the admission scam involved fake high school diplomas from the Canadian province of Ontario while there was also an increase in fake English-language tests detected. The university may now reintroduce Chinese credential qualification checks conducted by the Chinese government’s Department of Education to safeguard against future scams. Higher education expert with Australian National University, Andrew Norton, told the Herald the general experience at Australian universities was that levels of cheating among Chinese students were quite high. “If they’re catching that many I’d hate to see how high the real number is,” he said.
This raises questions about the extent of such cheating in the wider tertiary sector. At least on students from specific Indian states in response to a surge of applications from South Asia and an accompanying rise in what the Home Affairs Department described as fraudulent applications. Indian students comprise the second-largest intake after the Chinese.
Previously, Australian universities have confronted and addressed allegations of plagiarism among international students and the embarrassing high proportion of them who completed degrees despite being unable to speak or write English satisfactorily. However, some universities connive, too, at the debasement of their standards. With the latest revelation, the University of Sydney has obviously realised the threat and is preparing to bring in the Chinese government to stop the Canadian admission scam.
The overseas education industry is worth about $40 billion to Australia annually, trailing only iron ore, coal and natural gas as an export. Competition is fierce among the world’s universities, and for the ablest students an Australian institution is rarely the first choice. The quality of entrants may decline, and that would depress standards, or produce a financial crisis. If that brought about a re-evaluation of universities’ importance for Australia’s future, it might be no bad thing. Far better, though, if before that, the federal government could see where its extreme parsimony is leading our universities, and change course.
Bevan Shields sends an exclusive newsletter to subscribers each week. .
0 Comments