Australia has spent the week celebrating its biggest services export with a virtual showcase and conference for all professional recruiters and agencies sending students to study in the country.
Global Agent Week 2022 opened with a ministerial address from Minister for Trade and Tourism, Don Farrell.
“The Albanese Government supports our world-class international education sector,” Farrell said, highlighting commitment to the sector by the highest echelons of the Australian government.
“We are committed to maintaining a safe, inclusive, and respectful community for all. We will continue to work in partnership with you [the Agents] to prepare, welcome, and support our international students.”
Kate Young, Global Marketing Manager at Austrade, provided an update on the Study Australia brand and the Study Australia marketing toolkit. She explained what makes Study Australia, the country’s ‘Nation Brand’, unique.
Young provided details on how providers and agents could use the Study Australia Marketing Toolkit to “co-brand” with the Study Australia brand across social media, email headers, digital display banners, etc.
“We would welcome education agents to use Australia’s Nation Brand [in particular] in their next events,” she said.
The toolkit can be used by education providers, agents, study destinations, and government agencies — “eligible organisations with the responsibility of promoting Australian education internationally.”
“We now have over 700 assets available for download and we are continually adding new content,” Young added.
“The Study Australia Partnership, comprising Austrade and all state and territory study destination agencies, is delighted to again host Study Australia Global Agent Week in 2022,” Helen Kronberger, manager, international education (global engagement), Austrade, told The PIE.
“The event has been designed especially for Australia’s global network of education agents, to support our valued representatives with new insights and policy information related to the Study Australia opportunity.
“This year, the event includes new sessions featuring current students, international alumni, destination experts and leaders within the global agent community,” she said.
“Australia has built a trusted reputation for education, for training, and for research globally”
Speaking online to agent attendees, Kronberger outlined the USPs of the study destination.
“Australia is also one of the most economically and politically stable democracies in the world — individual freedoms are valued and a strong and transparent system of law and government protects the rights of international students and all people in our community,” she said.
“Studying in Australia also means high living standards and a great student experience, with seven student cities ranked in the top 50 student cities globally (by QS).
“Australia has built a trusted reputation for education, for training, and for research globally, due to over 70 years of international alumni success and our 2.5 million alumni worldwide,” Kronberger highlighted.
As part of the Study Australia Partnership, the state and territory study destination agencies detailed the opportunities where education agents can access and utilise resources to help promote various destinations to prospective students, in their respective regions.
“If you are an agent who’s based outside of Australia, you can access Study Queensland’s global network of education specialists. They represent 11 markets across the world and can help agents in their local markets,” Nancy Ly, manager – Queensland relations, at Study Queensland said.
“We would welcome education agents to use Australia’s Nation Brand”
“Those based in Australia can get in touch with our different study clusters for more region focussed destination marketing assets and resources,” she added.
“At Study Adelaide, we are all about collaboration and we really value the idea of seeing what you [agents] would recommend in terms of how we can promote the destination better and working with you and your agency around that,” Jane Johnston, chief executive of Study Adelaide, highlighted.
Austrade’s global agent week ends on December 2 with a panel of leaders in the global education agent space discussing opportunities and key messages in promoting Australia education and training.
