The colossus of Kensington joins big-five friend Monash U in taking Asia seriously.
The University of New South Wales announces its first international campus in Bengaluru (formerly Bangalore). It is the seventh Australian university with approval from the Indian national government’s University Grants Commission to establish an autonomous campus, without a local partner.
UNSW follows pathbreakers Deakin U and Uni Wollongong, both already teaching on their own campuses in the-free trade GIFT city, in Gujarat. Other Australian institutions with plans to open next year are La Trobe U (also in Bengaluru), Victoria U and Western Sydney U. Last week, Uni WA announced locations for campuses in Mumbai and Chennai are “finalised” and it would be the first Group of Eight member to “establish a physical academic presence in India.”
UNSW states it will teach UG business, media, computer and data science and PG cybersecurity in degrees that will “mirror” existing courses. The university’s Academic Board will oversee quality assurance and graduates “will receive the same UNSW qualifications as they do in Australia.”
Target enrolments are a “couple of hundred students” in the first year, reaching a “few thousand” in year 5 and 10,000 in a decade, according to a UNSW spokesperson.
Australian universities’ enthusiasm for India follows of decades of delay by protectionist state politics and the federal bureaucracy. The governance knot was broken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s determination to dramatically accelerate growth of post-school education and training.
Australia is making the running so far. The University of Southampton is up and teaching in India and three other UK universities are in the approval process. The Illinois Institute of Technology and Istituto Europeo di Design (Milan) also have permission to establish campuses and hire staff, in Mumbai, before final government approval.
These are all long-term investments, with initial enrolment targets generally set in the low-hundreds, rising to a few thousand as full degrees are taught.
For Australian universities however, India Is also an immediate political play, demonstrating they are committed to teaching off-shore and not packing more international students onto their home campuses. This may be why UNSW’s announcement just happened to be ready for Education Minister Jason Clare’s current India visit.
As UNSW put it yesterday, “The campus will also contribute to UNSW’s efforts to diversify international student recruitment markets.”
It is a big investment, based on the assumption that there is a market for Australian qualifications gained outside Australia and without the possible premium of post-study immigration.
But it appears the model can work – at least it looks like it in Malaysia. Monash U opened a college outside Kuala Lumpur in the early 1990s. It is still going strong and all up, Monash has 12,000 students offshore. So strong, Monash has just announced a new A$1bn KL campus, designed for 22,500 students and 1,700 staff “beyond 2040.”
Will it work in India? FC has a diary note to ask in 2050.
A way earlier question will be what are Uni Melbourne, Uni Queensland and Uni Sydney, the three other of the Big Five international education universities, going to do about diversifying offshore.