The research, carried out by aecc, found that 57% of the 70+ universities questioned were “somewhat concerned”, while 30% were “extremely concerned”.

Earlier in January, authorities announced that total study permits – bar masters, PhD, primary and secondary school students – for 2024 would be capped at 360,000.

Additionally, as part of the measures, new students enrolling at public-private partnership colleges will no longer be eligible for a post-graduation work permits.

However, more positive findings the new research suggested is that over four in 10 universities expect that their international enrolment targets will be slightly better or around the same as last year.

Some 4% of respondents – equivalent to one or two institutions – said they expect to perform significantly better than 2023.

A separate survey of over 5,500 prospective students found that 98.6% of them consider post graduate work permits extremely or moderately important to them when considering their studies in the country.

Around half (51.1%) said they’d “likely consider” changing or have already changed their preferred study destination if the PGWP duration was reduced.

Under new measures in Canada, individuals who meet eligibility criteria and graduate from master’s degrees that are less than two years will be eligible for a longer three-year post-graduation work permit from February 15.

PGWPs for other programs continue to be aligned with the length of the study program, to a maximum of three years.

Similar to the institutional responses, 79.5% of prospective international students considering Canada as a “extremely” or “somewhat concerned” about the government’s recent policy changes.

However, only 13.4% said they had actually changed their minds about their preferred study destination in the last 12 months.

Among the biggest reasons for students changing study destination preference was around concerns of high course costs in other countries, better job opportunities and concerns about negative policy changes for international students and slow visa processing times.

“It is still too early to determine how much of an effect the recent Canadian policy changes will have on prospective international students and their attitudes towards studying in Canada,” chief commercial officer at aecc, Jake Foster, said.

“Anything that makes it more difficult for students to access education in Canada is something that will concern prospective international students.

“We know that the vast majority of students are somewhat or extremely concerned about the Canadian government’s international student policy changes.”