Are universities letting international students in on lower grades?

But is this true? Director of Universities UK International, Jamie Arrowsmith, fact checks these claims.

‘Foreign students can buy their way on to highly competitive degree courses with as little as a handful of C grades at GCSE. The courses require British students to have A or A* grades at A-level.’

This is not true. The article presents entry requirements for foundation programmes alongside entry requirements for full degrees as though they were the same thing. This isn’t the case, so the article isn’t making a fair comparison – a point made by Sir Michael Fabricant MP in Parliament on 29 January 2024.

The article identifies specific foundation programmes that are offered to international students. These are specifically designed to help bridge any gap between the qualifications and education level of some international students and those expected for entry onto undergraduate programmes. For example, some international students may need an additional year’s preparation to meet university entry requirements – they may have only undertaken 12 years of education in their home system, rather than the 13 years which UK students will have typically completed.

International students might currently meet English language requirements and any other requirements for a foundation programme but may need to further develop their academic English skills before entering a full degree.

To be clear: to progress to full degree programmes, students must successfully complete the foundation programme and meet entry requirements set by the university, which will be equivalent to those for home students.

‘Britain’s top universities are paying middlemen to recruit lucrative overseas students on far lower grades than those required of UK applicants, an undercover investigation has revealed.’

Many universities use education agents to support recruitment of overseas students. This is standard practice globally. Using agents allows universities to benefit from economies of scale, providing access to global networks that are beyond the capability of an individual university to support.

High-quality agents and education counsellors can also play an important role in supporting prospective students to identify suitable programmes and universities for them, and to understand the visa and immigration requirements.

The investigation identified instances where advisory services have clearly not met the expected standards. These should be dealt with appropriately. However, the article fails to make clear the distinction between entry requirements for foundation programmes and entry requirements for undergraduate programmes. These are fundamentally different, and comparisons between the two are simply inaccurate.

Last year, Universities UK, BUILA, along with UKCISA and the British Council, launched the Agent Quality Framework. The aim of this voluntary framework is to raise standards and share good practice. We want to work with the government to see what more can be done to improve practice.

Many universities also offer tailored foundation programmes for UK students to bridge the gap for those who have the potential to succeed but may not yet meet entry requirements for a given university. The lower entry grades reflect the fact that the courses are delivering content at a lower level than degrees. They can support widening access to higher education by helping students with non-traditional qualifications or experience to progress to a degree. Foundation courses are delivered by universities or in partnership with further education colleges, and examples include University of Liverpool, University of Nottingham, and University of Oxford.

‘Representatives of the elite Russell Group universities were secretly filmed discussing the “back door” routes used to recruit overseas students, who pay much higher fees than their UK counterparts.’ 

Education pathways are not a ‘back door’ and any suggestion that they are is false. Any pathway programme must meet the standards set out by regulators. Those delivered in partnership with a university will be developed and quality assured through the same processes used for other qualifications delivered by the university.

Progression from a pathway course isn’t automatic or guaranteed. International students who successfully complete the pathway course must also satisfy the entry requirements for the full degree programme of their choice.

Where pathways are offered independently of a specific partner university, the providers will be regulated in line with the domestic regulatory standards in the relevant county. In England, this means that pathway providers offering foundation programmes should be registered with the Office for Students.

‘He added: “International [students] pay more money and the [universities] will receive almost double, so they give leeway for international students.” He claimed the universities did not publicise the schemes in the UK because British students “would not accept it”. He explained: “It’s not something they want to tell you, but it’s the truth.”’

This is misleading.

The international foundation programmes are generally not advertised to UK students as they are unsuitable for them. While there are examples of foundation programmes for both international and domestic students, in general these programmes are specifically designed to support non-UK students, covering areas such as English for academic purposes which may not be relevant for UK applicants.

As already outlined, UK universities offer many similar foundation programmes for domestic students. These are a key part of a university’s approach to widening access to higher education.

‘The “back door” routes are so lucrative that top universities are paying tens of millions of pounds a year to agents and private companies to hunt out wealthy students. Some of these businesses operate offices and run courses on university campuses, and their bosses are paid more than most vice-chancellors.’ 

Agent fees are paid as a commission based on fees secured from international students. The use of agents is widespread international practice in the recruitment of international students. Without them, universities would have to have many members of staff working around the world to support student applications. There is no cost to the UK taxpayer. It’s important that high standards of agent behaviour are upheld by universities. For this reason, we’ve worked with BUILA and others to develop the Agent Quality Framework.

Many pathway providers operate in partnership with universities. As part of the arrangement, they may have shared study centres and facilities and deliver teaching on programmes where the content, standards and quality assurance procedures are agreed with and monitored by the university.

‘The Sunday Times investigation discovered that overseas students wishing to study an economics degree using one of the pathways needed grades of CCC at Bristol; CCD at Durham; DDE at Exeter; DDE at Newcastle; and just a single D at Leeds. Yet the same universities’ A-level entry requirements for UK students is A*AA or AAA. All five universities also accept younger overseas students, who have not taken A-levels, with just five C or B grades at GCSE.’ 

This statement is misleading.

This compares entry requirements for international foundation programmes with full undergraduate degree programmes. These are distinct programmes with completely different entry requirements.

Acceptance onto an international foundation programme does not guarantee progression to a full undergraduate degree. It’s therefore misleading to claim that the requirements for acceptance onto the foundation programme mean that a student can access full undergraduate programmes directly.

‘Students on the pathways have to pass exams at the end of the year before joining the undergraduate degrees. However, the universities’ recruitment officials admitted that the exams were so easy that passing was a formality.’

The comments made by the agent are misleading. Students are not guaranteed progression to the full degree programme. Claiming otherwise is a serious matter and one that should be dealt with appropriately.

Pathway providers report that, even after one year of intensive study, 20–25% of students do not progress from the pathway programme onto a full undergraduate programme at the partner university.

This includes students who have formally passed the foundation programme but haven’t met the wider requirements of the specific undergraduate programme applied for.

There is no guarantee of progression if students do not meet the standards required by the institution.

‘A third recruitment official said at least 30 per cent of foreign students entering UK universities were using the back door routes, which equates to more than 30,000 a year.’  

No source or evidence is provided for this claim, and we believe that it is inaccurate.  

There were 679,000 international students at UK universities in 2021–22, so 30,000 students would represent around 4% of all international students or 10% of al international undergraduate students. 

The total number of international undergraduate students studying at undergraduate level was just under 307,000, so 30% of this cohort would equal 92,000 students.

The numbers quoted do not appear to reflect publicly available data. 

‘According to the Higher Education Statistics Agency, overseas students take a third of all UK university places — the number increased from 469,000 to 689,000 between 2018 and 2022.’ 

This is incorrect. 

According to HESA data, in 2021-22 international students made up 24% of all student enrolments.

Most international students study at postgraduate level, and they make up 45% of all postgraduate students in the UK. 

The vast majority of undergraduate students at UK universities are domestic students – in fact, 85% of undergraduate students in UK universities are from the UK. 

Despite significant growth in the overall number of international students attending UK universities between 2017–18 and 2021–22, the proportion of non-UK international students at undergraduate level barely changed – rising from 14.3% to 15.1% over the period. 

‘Analysis of degree results shows that students from outside the EU have been performing far worse than UK students: they are more than twice as likely to receive a lower second or third-class degree.’ 

Analysis of the 2021–22 HESA student record does not suggest this. Approximately 20% of UK students achieve a 2.2, third or pass. This figure is 27% for non-European students.  

Furthermore, overall pass rates between the groups are similar, along with the proportion achieving a 2.1. 

‘Many of Britain’s universities are in financial crisis. They are heavily dependent on tuition fees, which account for half their funding. But tuition fees for UK students have risen by only £250 since David Cameron’s government raised the cap to £9,000 a year in 2012.’  

This is largely correct. 

International students make a significant financial contribution to the higher education sector. The real-terms value of domestic tuition fees has eroded due to inflation following years of funding freezes, and university research funding doesn’t cover costs – this means that universities now lose £1 billion each year on teaching UK students and £5 billion on undertaking research. 

Analysis of university financial forecasts from PwC, commissioned by us, shows that even a fall in the rate of growth for international student numbers would have a significant impact on university finances. Yet all indications are that numbers are already falling. 

If anticipated growth in international students were to decrease by 20 percentage points below university forecasts in 2024–25, around 80% of institutions in England and Northern Ireland would be in deficit in 2025–26.