The Australian government has allocated AUS$16.5m of funding available to over 5,000 Australian students to support their study abroad experiences, enhance their future job prospects and help Australia build ties with overseas institutions, following an announcement this week by Minister for Education, Christopher Pyne.
Under the government’s new global student mobility programmes, students will receive up to AUS$5000 to allow them to undertake part of their Australian course of study overseas in Europe, the Americas, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific.
The funding will be offered via the International Student Exchange Program, the Study Overseas Short-Term Mobility Program, the Vocational Education and Training Outbound Mobility Program and the AsiaBound Program.
“The government is focused on ensuring Australia is an outward-looking nation, fully engaged internationally and our students have the best opportunities available to them,” Pyne said.
“This Australian government funding will provide learning opportunities for students to get international experience and form networks around the globe”
“This Australian government funding will provide learning opportunities for students to get international experience and form networks around the globe,” he added.
The new funding will compliment the AUS$100m allocated over four years for the New Colombo Plan (NCP), part of the government’s ongoing plans to increase collaboration with Asia Pacific, which also recently added India to its framework.
A range of study and work experience opportunities will be available to students under the new funding including internships in the United States House of Representatives or Senate, working with occupational therapy, physiotherapy and speech pathology patients in Vietnam and caring for rescued orang-utans in Indonesia’s rehabilitation and rescue centres.
The new programmes will also support student exchange in the private sector between Australia and Asia specifically through the Endeavour Cheung Kong Student Exchange Programme, jointly funded by the Australian government and the Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong Group. The Cheung Kong Group has businesses in 52 countries and has invested AUS$12bn in Australia’s energy, telecommunications, transport, port, and bio-technology industries.
Pyne’s office pointed out that overseas study opportunities for Australian students complement the growth in international student enrolments in Australia, which grew by more than 10 percent in the first half of 2014, compared with the same period in 2013.
