The global language learning market is changing at rapid pace due to the adoption of cost-efficient technology-based products and the migration away from classroom and print products, according to Ambient Insight, an international market research firm specialising in e-learning and mobile learning.

Ambient predicts that the future lies in English language learning products, which generated US $35.9 billion in 2011 (offline and online combined). This represents 61.7% of the total language learning market, making it the largest concentrated revenue opportunity in the international language learning market.

And like most things these days, the biggest potential is online. By 2016, expenditures on digital English language learning products will account for 7.3% (or US $2.5 billion) of the global English language learning market. The current digital English language learning revenues are heavily concentrated in five learning product types:

• Self-paced elearning
• Digital referenceware (etextbooks)
• Collaboration-based learning
• Mobile learning apps
• Mobile learning Value Added Services (VAS)

In their report entitled “The Worldwide Market for Digital English Language Learning Products and Services: 2011-2016 Forecast and Analysis,” Ambient explains that the substantial growth in revenues for digital English language learning products over the forecast period is due to several convergent catalysts:

• Consumer demand for digital language learning products
• The recent explosion of subscription-based mobile learning VAS
• The digitisation efforts in academic markets across the globe
• Migration to digital formats by major international publishers
• Government-mandated English language learning initiatives in school systems
• The shortage of English teachers in high-demand countries

Digital trends in the classroom

There are now major digitisation efforts going on in the school systems around the world, notably in South Korea, Thailand, China, Taiwan, Turkey, Brazil, Russia, France, Poland, Spain, the Ukraine, Mexico, Japan, Singapore, United Arab Emirates (UAE), the UK and the US. Some examples include:

• In June 2011, the South Korean Education Ministry mandated that all instructional content in all primary and secondary schools must be 100% digital by 2015. By 2015, every school child in South Korea will be carrying a personal learning device.
• Turkey intends to equip over 15 million students with tablets in the next four years, which represents a huge delivery system for learning technology suppliers. The Turkish government began distributing the tablets to schools in February 2012 and (like South Korea) intends to have all print-based textbooks replaced with etextbooks in four years.
• Thailand also began distributing tablets to their primary students in June of this year. Yet due to teacher-training and curriculum challenges, some fear the results might mimic those of Peru’s One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project.

These trends are driving major international print publishers of English language learning textbooks and test prep content to move rapidly to digital formats. Cengage Learning, McGraw-Hill, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Macmillan, Pearson, Oxford University Press, and Cambridge University Press are all aggressively shifting their language learning product portfolios to digital formats.

As schools across the globe migrate to digital content, a massive amount of commercial, open, and indigenous print-based English language learning content will be moved to digital formats. This represents a significant revenue opportunity for suppliers that offer conversion services.

According to Cambridge University Press, there are over 100 countries in which English is designated as the “first foreign language” taught in schools, and the British Council reports that there are over 30 additional countries in which English has an official status.

Government mandates promote English

New government mandates for school systems designed to increase proficiency in the English language have been initiated in countries around the world. The governments of Rwanda, South Sudan, Turkey, the Russian Federation, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Brazil, Chile, and Argentina have instituted broad-reaching federal programmes designed to increase English proficiency.

Some of these mandates are minor adjustments to current mandates. For example, in June 2011, Saudi Arabia began offering English language learning starting in fourth grade, two years earlier than the previous mandate. And prior to February 2012, English language learning began in first grade in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Now, English is introduced to Dubai students in kindergarten.

Other mandates are sweeping in scope:

• Rwanda is a predominately French-speaking country with over 10 million people, yet in 2009 the government mandated that all primary education had to be taught in English.
• When South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, the new government proclaimed that English would be the national language even though very few people in the new country speak English.
• In late 2010, the Russian Federation mandated that fluent English would be a requirement to become a civil servant starting in 2012.
• In 2011, the Ministry of Education and Training in Vietnam made English language learning compulsory starting in fourth grade. The government intends to have 80,000 English language teachers in the country by 2020, but is having difficulty finding qualified teachers.
• In 2011, Japan made English language learning compulsory in all Japanese primary schools. Previous to this mandate, students were introduced to English in junior high school.
• In December 2011, the government of Thailand launched their 2012 English Speaking Year project with the ambitious goal to teach English to 14 million students in 34,000 state schools across Thailand from pre-primary to university age.

For examples of university systems around the globe switching to English-medium instruction, please see our article “Trend alert: English spreads as teaching language in universities worldwide.”

Teaching training opportunities

In the presence of minor and major mandates like this, it should be no surprise that there is now a significant shortage of English language teachers in several countries, and this is a catalyst for technology-based products and services.

The shortage of teachers is driving the demand for both self-paced products and live remote tutoring by native English-speaking teachers based outside the respective countries.

For example, in May 2011, the Turkish government announced that they would recruit 40,000 native-speaking English languages teachers as part of a four-year billion dollar initiative to increase English language skills in their primary and secondary schools.

The first phase of the initiative began in 2011 and involved hiring English teachers in the US to tutor Turkish students remotely in real time via collaboration-based learning technology.

Top growth countries

Ambient’s report forecasts the revenues for digital English language learning products and services across seven regions: North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, Middle East, and Africa. The report also identifies the top buying countries in each region and provides a five-year forecast for each of those countries.

Asia has the highest growth rate followed by Africa, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. Western Europe and North America are the most mature markets and have relatively low growth rates. The region with the lowest growth rate is North America, which masks the fact that it spends the most on digital English language learning products.

The top buying country for digital English language learning in 2011 was the US, followed by South Korea, China, Japan, and Brazil. By 2016, the largest buying countries will be China, South Korea, the US, Brazil, and Japan, respectively. Turkey, India, the Russian Federation, Spain, and Poland will also be in the top ten buying countries by 2016.

In terms of growth, the countries with the highest growth rates are Malaysia, China, Romania, Ukraine, Indonesia, Brazil, Poland, India, Georgia, and the Russian Federation. The growth rates in Malaysia, China, Romania, and Ukraine are all above 30%, more than twice the worldwide aggregate growth rate.

There are spikes in spending in certain countries due to a variety of factors. For example, the Brazilian Ministry of Tourism intends to provide English training to 306,000 tourism professionals in preparation for the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016.

For the full report, please see “The Worldwide Market for Digital English Language Learning Products and Services: 2011-2016 Forecast and Analysis.”

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Education at a Glance reviews education levels and student numbers, the economic and social benefits of education, public and private spending on education, tuition fees, decision-making powers of schools, national examination systems, the school environment, as well as equity and accessibility in education.

The report can be accessed via the link above, and we’ve pulled out a few highlights from various articles provided by University World News, as well as a video summary below of key findings from Andreas Schleicher, OECD Deputy-Director of Education.

Who studies abroad and where?

Europe is the preferred destination for those studying outside their country, and has 41% of all international students. North America has 21% of all international students. Australia, France, Germany, and the UK and the US each receive more than 6% of all foreign students worldwide.

Nevertheless, the fastest growing regions of destination are Latin America and the Caribbean, Oceania and Asia, mirroring the internationalisation of universities in an increasing set of countries.

International students from OECD countries mainly come from Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Turkey and the US, and they make up 10% or more of the enrolments in tertiary education in Australia, Austria, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Switzerland and the UK.

They also account for more than 20% of enrolments in advanced research programmes in Australia, Austria, Canada, Denmark, Ireland, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the US.

In 2010, more than 4.1 million tertiary students were enrolled outside their country of citizenship, which represents an average annual growth rate of 7.1% from 2000 to 2010. Luxembourg, Australia, the United Kingdom, Austria, Switzerland and New Zealand have, in descending order, the highest percentages of international students among their tertiary enrolments.

The number of foreign students enrolled in OECD countries was almost three times the number of citizens from an OECD country studying abroad in 2010. In the 21 European countries that are members of the OECD, there were 2.7 foreign students per each European citizen enrolled abroad.

Some 83% of all foreign students are enrolled in G20 countries, while 77% of all foreign students are enrolled in OECD countries, and these proportions have remained stable during the past decade.

A significant portion of students coming from G20 non-OECD countries includes the better-performing students, natural candidates for public or private support, or students who have a relatively high socio-economic background.

This implies that student mobility can not only bring stature to tertiary institutions’ academic programmes, but also economic benefits to the host country’s education systems.

Longer-term trends

The number of students enrolled outside their country of citizenship has risen dramatically from 0.8 million worldwide in 1975 to 4.1 million in 2010 – an increase of more than five-fold.

The jump stems from various factors, from an interest in promoting academic, cultural, social and political ties between countries (especially as the European Union was taking shape), to a substantial increase in global access to tertiary education, and reduced transportation costs.

The internationalisation of labour markets for highly skilled individuals has also given people an incentive to gain international experience as part of their studies.

The increase in the number of foreign students can be compared to the increase in tertiary enrolment worldwide. According to UNESCO data, 177 million students participated in formal tertiary education around the world in 2010 – an increase of 77 million students (or 77%) since 2000.

Most of the new foreign tertiary students come from countries outside the OECD area, and are likely gradually to increase the proportion of foreign students in advanced research programmes in OECD and in G20 countries in the coming years.

In absolute terms, the number of foreign students enrolled in tertiary education has more than doubled since 2005 in Brazil, Chile, Estonia, Iceland, Indonesia, Ireland, Korea, Luxembourg, Saudi Arabia, the Slovak Republic and Spain.

In contrast, the number of foreign students enrolled in France, Germany, Mexico and New Zealand grew by less than 10%.

OECD urges nations to boost spending on education

OECD Secretary General Angel Gurría said nations need an increasingly educated and skilled workforce in order to succeed in today’s knowledge economy, noting that investing from an early age was crucial to lay the foundations for later success.

“High quality education and skills have to be among the number one priorities for governments, for economies and for societies. Supporting the poorest and ensuring equal access is another important pillar in an inclusive education policy strategy,” he said.

The report’s authors say Australia, Finland, Ireland and Sweden have the highest success rates in the OECD for young people of poorly educated parents attaining a tertiary degree.

But in Italy, Portugal, Turkey and the United States, more than 40% of young people from low educational backgrounds have not completed upper secondary education, and less than 20% have obtained degrees.

Investment in education

Public and private spending on education has continued to rise, even during the economic downturn. Between 2008 and 2009, total investment – by governments, enterprises and individuals – increased in 24 out of 31 OECD countries for which data were available. This occurred even as national wealth, as measured by GDP, decreased in 26 of these countries.

Similarly, as University World News highlights, expenditure per student by primary, secondary and post-secondary education institutions increased by 15 percentage points on average across OECD countries between 2005 and 2009.

Some of the emerging economies are leading the way. In Brazil and the Russian Federation, spending per student rose by around 60 percentage points over the same period, albeit from comparatively low levels. Meanwhile, per-student expenditure by tertiary institutions rose an average of nine percentage points during this same period.

But while public spending on education as a percentage of total public expenditure remained at 13% on average across the OECD in 2005 and 2009, it fell in 19 out of 32 countries – an outcome almost certainly related to the onset and deepening of the global recession during the latter part of this time frame.

Private funding, mainly from parents, represents on average 30% of total expenditure on tertiary education.

Yet the gap between public and private contributions in the various countries is huge, with the proportion of private spending on higher education ranging from less than 5% in Denmark, Finland and Norway to more than 40% in Australia, Israel, Japan and the US, and to more than 70% in Chile, Korea and the UK.

“The increasing costs of entry to higher education for many families may impede countries’ own goals of increasing educational attainment in their populations,” the OECD report warns.

Tuition fees

As University World News points out, an increasing number of OECD countries are charging higher tuition fees for international students than for national students, and many also differentiate tuition fees by field of education, largely because of the difference in the public cost of studies.

In Australia, Chile, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and the United Kingdom, grants-scholarships and loans are particularly developed, and public support to households account for at least 27% of public tertiary education budgets.

Among the European countries for which data are available, only public tertiary institutions in Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom (government-dependent private institutions) charge annual tuition fees of more than US $1,200 per full-time national student.

Budgetary pressures stemming from the global economic crisis may make it more difficult for countries that have lower tuition fees to sustain this model in the future.

There are large differences among countries in the average tuition fees charged by tertiary-type A institutions for national students.

In the five Nordic countries with more progressive tax structures – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden – and in the Czech Republic and Mexico, public institutions do not charge tuition fees. Ireland could also be included in this category, as the tuition fees charged by public institutions (for full-time undergraduate students from the European Union) are paid directly by the government.

By contrast, tuition fees are higher in one-third of the countries and they reach more than US $5,000 in Korea and the United States. Meanwhile, in Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland and Spain, students pay small tuition fees for tertiary type A education.

Shifts in attainment levels

As summarised by University World News, if current tertiary attainment rates among 25- to 34-year-olds are maintained, the proportion of adults in Ireland, Japan and Korea, among other countries, who have a tertiary education will grow to more than that of other OECD countries, while the proportion in Austria, Brazil and Germany (among others) will fall further behind other OECD countries.

Vocational education and training is a major factor in the educational attainment of people in many countries. A vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education is the highest level of attainment for more than 50% of 25- to 64-year-olds in Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, the Slovak Republic and Slovenia.

Despite notable strides, some countries remain far below the OECD average in terms of upper secondary attainment. For example, in Brazil, China, Mexico, Portugal and Turkey roughly half of all 25- to 34-year-olds – or far more – lack an upper secondary education.

Based on current patterns of graduation, it is estimated that an average of 39% of today’s young adults in OECD countries will complete tertiary-type A (largely theory-based) education over their lifetimes, from 50% or more in Australia, Denmark, Iceland, Poland and the United Kingdom to less than 25% in Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

At the same time, it is expected that only a third of young adults will complete tertiary education before the age of 30, from a high of more than 40% in Australia, Denmark, Ireland, Poland and the United Kingdom to only 18% in Mexico.

Video summary

Andreas Schleicher, OECD Deputy-Director of Education speaks about the key finding of this year’s OECD Education at Glance explaining that education spending is rising but access to higher education remains unequal in most countries. Governments should increase investment in early childhood programmes and maintain reasonable costs for higher education in order to reduce inequality, boost social mobility and improve people’s employment prospects.

Please visit the OECD website for further report information such as detailed country by country notes.

Sources: OECD, University World News

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In the course of her work, Karin travels throughout Latin America to visit agents, participate in educator delegations touring the region, and attend industry events. Most recently, she attended the Expo BELTA in Sao Paulo, joined an Education New Zealand delegation of 16 educators touring Brazil, Colombia, and Chile, and attended the Conference of the Americas in Rio de Janeiro.

In the course of those recent travels, she joined agent-educator meetings in Santiago and Bogota and provided detailed briefings on key Latin American markets. Read on for some of the highlights from her briefings.

Latin America

Latin America is an agent-focused education market with the vast majority of student referrals made through agents. As in many world markets, personal relationships are fundamental to the development of effective business linkages and patience is a virtue. Educators with limited or no experience in Latin markets are encouraged to adopt a long-term view and to allow some time to learn the many distinct markets across the region and to become acquainted with the culture.

Ironically, the pace of decision-making among students, families, and agents is anything but leisurely. Latin Americans work hard and play hard and are inclined to making decisions, even relatively big ones such as study abroad, at more or less the last minute. Educators will need to be nimble and responsive in order to capitalize on opportunities to recruit qualified students. Educators recruiting in the region should also be alert to the fact that many students will need to upgrade their English skills for academic study abroad.

Colombia

Other than Brazil, no other Latin American market sends more students abroad than Colombia. Colombia was one of the fastest-growing Latin economies in 2011 and is on pace for another strong showing this year. Within the country, the strongest study abroad markets are found in Bogotá, Cali, and Medellin with Bucaramanga also growing quickly.

There is a strong recognition within the country of the relationship between study abroad and the prospects for future success. Colombian students and working professionals are highly motivated to improve their English language skills and university-age students are also interested in undergraduate and postgraduate degrees abroad.

The last decade has seen a number of new agents enter the market in Colombia, most of which are small, boutique operations serving local areas. Also of note is an increasing internationalisation of Colombian higher education institutions with an ever-growing range of scholarly exchange, joint programmes, and student mobility programmes between Colombian and foreign educators.

In considering opportunities abroad, Colombian students value affordability, opportunities to combine work and study, and safe, multicultural environments. Colombian students require a visa for almost all countries, and leading destinations currently include the US, Australia, UK, Canada, and New Zealand.

Chile

Chile is noted for its stable government and robust economy. Roughly 80% of the Chilean population lives in the country’s Central Valley – home to the major cities of Santiago and Valparaiso. The Greater Santiago Area alone has a population of more than 6.5 million and accounts for the majority of students who study abroad.

Like many other Latin markets, agents play an important role in Chile and account for the majority of student referrals. However, the market is also notably concentrated with a relatively small number of established agencies. Families also have a strong voice in a student’s final study decision, hence, word-of-mouth promotion among families and students is another important factor.

Demand remains strong for English language training as well, the strongest driver for which is the demand in Chile for English-speaking professionals, entrepreneurs, academics, and technicians. At all levels, Chilean students appreciate accreditations and certificates; it is important for them to be “part of something” in this respect and to be recognised for their studies abroad.

While a strong advocate of its domestic institutions, the Chilean government supports the internationalisation of its education system – including programmes promoting overseas scholarships for undergraduate, postgraduate and technical courses, the most notable of which is Becas Chile. These programmes are nicely aligned with a growing demand among Chilean students for higher education studies abroad, especially at the postgraduate level.

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