CDU to attract more international students to the Territory as part of student recruitment exercise

Charles Darwin University (CDU) is drawing its attention to India, Nepal and Bangladesh to attract and retain more students from the sub-continent into study pathways in the Territory.

CDU’s focus is on attracting students to fill its new city campus, which is due for completion in 2024, to grow its international student cohort and attract students to the NT to address worker shortages across major employment sectors.

With international borders now open, CDU’s Vice-Chancellor and staff will travel to India on May 21 as part of a two-week trip to meet with universities, diplomats, government officials, and education specialists in a bid to promote studying at CDU to students.

The subcontinent is CDU’s largest source of international students, particularly India and Nepal.

These three countries combined contribute to almost 44 per cent of CDU’s international student cohort, with Nepal accounting for 18 per cent, India accounting for 17 per cent and Bangladesh accounting for nine per cent.

Newly arrived students contribute more than $40,000 each to the local economy each year. International students generated $145 million for the NT’s economy in 2019 alone and supported more than 600 jobs.

CDU will meet with agents and potential students in each major region of India, Nepal, and Bangladesh and will support the University’s strategic objective recruitment team in increasing international student numbers.

CDU Vice-Chancellor Scott Bowman said the student recruitment and engagement visit would support the recruitment of further international students into the Territory community.

“As the city campus starts to take shape, we need to attract more international students to study, live and work in the Territory,” Professor Bowman said.

“The flow-on benefits to the Territory community as a result of recruiting more students from the sub-continent will be felt by economics into the town, in more opportunities and jobs filled.”

“Our main focus will be attracting students to fill our new city campus, which is due for completion in 2024, to grow our student cohort from Asia and other countries to address worker shortages across the employment sectors.”

Professor Bowman said the university will develop more opportunities for Australian students to travel to India, Nepal and Bangladesh if they choose to as a part of their studies at CDU.

CDU has almost 350 international students from India, 372 from Nepal and 152 from Bangladesh and seeks to expand its numbers to 4,000 students by 2025.

As a part of the visit to Bangladesh, Professor Bowman will meet with representatives from the University of Dhaka to develop partnerships for CDU students and attract more students to study at CDU.