As the Recruitment Director, Diwakar’s role is focused on leading and overseeing all student recruitment activity in South Asia. Working in conjunction with the global recruitment team & university partners, his responsibilities include ensuring that students and their advisors receive outstanding service supported by customer-focused processes. Diwakar brings to INTO a wealth of regional expertise and global mindset. With 1.5 decade long experience in the higher education sector, he currently develops and maintains partnerships with key stakeholders in India along with building preference for university partners in US, UK, and Australia.
Education tops the priority list of any student who is in their formative years of career building. To realise their dreams, GenZ is looking to move and stay overseas for further studies for reasons more than one.
As per the data of India’s Bureau of Immigration (BoI), 444,500 students moved abroad in 2021 to study. As of 20th March 2022, 133,000 students had already left for overseas study. During 2020-2021, for higher education, Indian student enrolments in UK had increased to 53,015 which was less than 20,000 in 2018. According to Government of UK, university enrolment among Indian students continues to grow significantly, with a 44% increase in the year ending May 2022. During the 2020/21 academic year, there were more than 93,000 Indian students enrolled in undergraduate, graduate, and non-degree programmes within US higher education.
In a recent survey by INTO University Partnerships of over 1000 students from India, it was found that over 75% of Gen Z students wanted to move abroad to study and eventually settle down. The INTO survey also revealed that the US continues to be the top destination for Indian students (31%), followed by Canada (23%) and the UK (17%).
Let’s look at some of the reasons which attracts Gen Z to move abroad:
Employment Prospects
The bright employment prospects are one of the most attractive reasons why students opt to stay abroad after completing their degrees. For freshers, entering a job market appears to be a daunting task but there are many good opportunities out there accompanied with attractive starting pay packages. In today’s world students with international degrees have an advantage as companies have a preference for such degree holders. The ones with previous work experience have an added advantage. Students from fields like robotics, computer science, artificial intelligence and so on have a plethora of opportunities and are in high demand by companies which look for high skill set employees. Their high demand and sophisticated dexterity render them handsome compensation.
More options than traditional courses
Foreign universities have multiple institutions which offer a variety of unconventional courses like AI, computer sciences, robotics etc. These courses are out of the box options and are also in more demand due to their unique and in today’s world, indispensable nature. Abroad, colleges offer courses beyond the traditional realm of technology, science, arts, and commerce. Globally, education system has been evolving at a fast pace offering new courses and career opportunities. Students are therefore flying out to make most of it.
Immigration
Settling overseas is a dream that many young students harbour. The reasons for which are plenty like better livelihoods, opportunities and so on. The easiest way to setting up a home abroad is through the education route. UK, US and Canada offer golden paths to students after placements as they receive flexible visas like part time visas, post study visas which offer a lot of relief to young students.
Research opportunities
Top ranked universities in US, UK, Canada offer great opportunities for research scholars and post-doctoral students. Research oriented students always place foreign countries in top of their lists as the institutions are also equipped with post-doctoral research system. Post-doctoral course from reputed universities pave way for bright career prospects. Replete with respectable job offers, a good salary is also promised. Research scholars get an assured visa for five-six years that is highly beneficial. Hence to give a sound boost to their research careers, students move abroad.