Thinking About Increasing the Number of International Students to Your College or University? The Challenging Question of Whether to Use Agents.

Gary Rhodes
Associate Dean, International Education & Senior International Officer,
College of Extended & International Education
Director, Center for Global Education
California State University at Dominguez Hills

Since I started working in the international higher education field, I have found that one of the most controversial issues has always been the question of whether to use agents to help recruit international students.

When I first got into the study abroad field, one of the most controversial issues was about whether study abroad that was not integrated into a foreign university campus was serious study abroad. Since that time, as the study abroad field has worked to increase participation numbers, there has been a greater flexibility about what constitutes “real study abroad.”

After talking to colleagues and reading the literature about the use of agents to help recruit international students, my impression is that this subject, from a U.S. perspective, is still one of the most controversial in the field.

I planned to write a short newsletter article for July 2015 making sense of the questions and issues. After I was finishing my sixth page and still had much more to write about, my colleagues at Terra Dotta suggested that we give more space to the article and include it in the August newsletter.

However, I thought it might be interesting to provide you with ten of the questions that the article will be responding to:

How can anyone really figure out what the best university is for them in the U.S. with the thousands of options?
If you represent a university that is not “highly ranked” by U.S. News and World Report Best Global Universities, Shanghai Jiao-Tong Academic Ranking of World Universities, Times Higher Education World University Rankings, or the QS World University Rankings, what can agents do that a college or university can’t do itself to get international students to study there (rankings is another controversial topic in the field).
Do universities in some other countries use agents more than colleges and universities do in the U.S.? If so, why?
What are the differences between an agent working with international students and the college consultants that are paid (often thousands of dollars) to help U.S. students get into college?
If a college or university does use an agent, should the international student and their families pay the agent or should the U.S. college or university pay the agent? What about double-dipping (if the agent gets paid by both the student and their family AND the U.S. college or university)?
What are the advantages of using an agency, an individual agent, or a sub-agent?
If you do use an agent, how can you figure out whether they act in an ethical manner (how important is it to have them approved by a standards organization)?
What training should a U.S. college or university provide to an agent to ensure that they are providing an honest and appropriate picture to the prospective students and parents?
With the many agencies, individual agents, and sub-agents that are working in many areas around the world, what are the critical elements in making a decision on which to work with?
If your institution has an English as a Second Language Program, opportunities for short-term, non-degree study and undergraduate and graduate degree programs, should you use one agent for all of these programs or separate agents for each program?

I hope these questions give you issues to think about and that my article in August assists you as you consider whether to use agencies, agents, and sub-agents to recruit international students to your campus.