The Shadowy Business of International Education

When I began reporting on the international student industry in Canada, I already knew it was a big business. Foreign students bring $22 billion into the economy annually, and Canada’s postsecondary institutions are increasingly reliant on ballooning international tuition fees.

But my image of the typical international student was all wrong.

The stereotype of the wealthy children of the global elite, usually from China, parachuting into a Canadian university for a quick degree is hopelessly outdated. The teenagers I spoke with are representative of the new class of students propping up our postsecondary institutions: kids from rural India, many of whose parents mortgaged their family farms to pay tuition at unremarkable community colleges, betting everything on the hope of one day gaining permanent residency.

The story "The Shadowy Business of International Education," on the cover of this month’s issue of The Walrus, follows these students from rural Punjab, through the unregulated world of education agents, to schools across Canada, where they too often experience exploitation, depression, and worse.

It reveals a big business that benefits everyone from agents to schools to Canadian employers—everyone, that is, except the students themselves. Read "The Shadowy Business of International Education" here.

—Nicholas Hune-Brown