The impact of exchange rate variations and university reputation on the choice of destinations of international students in Australia and New Zealand

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to determine the degree to which changes in exchange rates have an impact of the choices made by students when they travel abroad to undertake higher education. As well as changes in exchange rates other factors are also considered such as changes in the real income of students, and the reputation of universities. The findings were that exchange rate changes do have an influence on the demands of international students, although this is not uniform in nature across countries. This has important implications for policy makers as in a number of countries, such as Australia and New Zealand, government universities are often very reliant on the income generated by selling educations services to overseas students.