Foreign Students An Answer to Skills Shortage

Foreign students could help to ease the skills crisis, with a nationwide survey revealig two-thirds plan to stay on and work after graduating.

The survey, to be released today by Graduate Careers Australia (GCA), shows 65 per cent of international students intend to apply for permanent residence either during or after their studies.

However, only 6.8 per cent had already secured permanent residence. They were less confident of finding work that their Australian counterparts and rated their employability skills lower, accoridng to a report base don the survey of 32,000 international and domestic students.

“With the current skills shortage in some areas, many recruiters are taking an increasing interest in graduating international students,” GCA chielf executive Cindy Tilbrook said.

She said a quarter of graduate recruiters now included international students in their annual intakes.

But te head of the careers centre at the University of Western, Les Emery, said many large firms still found hiring international graduates too risky because there was no guarantee they would gain permanent residence.

Changes late last year mean international students can apply for an 18-month visa for further study, work or travel in Australia once they graduate. But unless they gather enough points for permanent residence, they must then return home.

“Small employers who have prroject-based work or really just need need a job and don’t necessarily have a graduate development prpgram per se perhaps more interested, but bigger companies who have a long-term investment in mind are a bit anxious about what happens at the enbd of 18 months,” Mr Emery said.

GHD chief people officer David Beech Jones said said the company had sourced enough Australians and New Zealand nationals this year, putting on 230 engineers, applied scientiests and architects.

“But in the future it is possible we may need to recruit international graduates to Western Australia and south-east Queeensland,” he said.

CGA surveyed 28,000 domestic and 4000 international students at 18 universities. The survey, funded by the federal Education Department, is said to be the biggest of its kind undertaken in Australia.

Overall, students valued job security and work-life balance over salary and perks. Job secuirty was important to more than 80 per cent of respondents.

Three-quarters of the students surveyed, mostly undergraduates,  said they would take a job with good work-life balance over one with a higher salary, and 60 per cent said they were willing to work additional unpai hours to further thier careers.

Business, accountants and economics students were most likely to feel that a successful career was the most important goal. They were also least likely to find making a contribution to society of high importance.

CGA’s 2007 survey showed the number of employers hiring overseas graduates increased from 15.7 per cent in 2004 to 24.1 per cent last year.-Australian Financial Review, 02 July, 2008