Market intelligence for international student recruitment from ICEF
14th Nov 2014

Five for Friday

For this instalment in our occasional “Five for Friday” column, we have gathered below some of the more eye-catching and varied items that we’ve been reading lately. We present them here for your end-of-week reading pleasure.

When admissions becomes marketing

This post from College Admissions Today has been nagging at us for a little while now. It makes the interesting point that admissions staff are now often asked to play a more direct role with respect to marketing and recruitment, and raises some interesting questions about how this impacts workloads and focus in the admissions office.

Is Japan going to hit its target?

Japan aims to attract 300,000 foreign students by 2020. The good news: there is just one thing standing in its way. The bad news: that one thing is China. The Japan Times reports on how China’s efforts to attract greater numbers of international students are drawing market share from Japan.

Saudi Arabia tops the first ranking of Arab universities

Saudi Arabia owns the top three positions in an initial ranking of 91 Arab universities in 16 countries published recently by US News & World Report. The rankings are notably concentrated: the top seven countries counted 77 universities in the table (85% of the total), while seven other countries - Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen - had only one ranked university each.

Pearson launches new English test

Education giant Pearson and the online language learning platform busuu have partnered for the global launch of a new English proficiency exam: the Global Scale of English Test (GSET). busuu is the first company worldwide to offer the test, on exclusive terms with Pearson for an initial six-month period.

We’ve looked at Facebook from all sides now

Social marketing specialist Brian Carter offers an unvarnished view of Facebook: the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this nicely balanced post, he offers a compact summary of the challenges - and strengths - of this key social media platform.

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Because you found this article interesting

Global student satisfaction survey highlights growing attention to career services The 2025 Global Student Satisfaction Awards were announced this week, and they provide some important indicators of student...
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OECD tracks global student flows to developed market-based economies The OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) is an inter-governmental organisation made up of 38 member countries....
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UK ELT reports declining enrolments for first half of 2025 Extending the global pattern reported for 2024 of declining English language learning enrolments, English UK’s quarterly reporting for...
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Global ELT volumes dipped in 2024 Globally, the ELT sector gave back some hard-won, post-pandemic gains in 2024. An annual study of eight top...
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New analysis forecasts marginal growth for foreign enrolment in Australia through 2030 In the five years leading up to the pandemic, Australia’s foreign enrolment grew at an average of 10%...
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China opens up to global STEM talent with new visa class The contrast offered by the global news headlines over the past couple of weeks could not have been...
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US proposes new rules for student visas including term limits and other restrictions On 28 August 2025, the US Department of Homeland Security published a proposed rule: Establishing a Fixed Time...
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US Office of Management and Budget grants budget reprieve to key exchange programmes In a highly unusual intervention in an area of Congressional authority, the US Office of Management and Budget...
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