In total, 70% of representatives from the 53 institutions participating in the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) report said they’d experienced a ‘significant’ decrease in year-on-year applications to postgraduate programs from candidates outside of the European Union. Overall, 90% of surveyed deans said that non-EU applications had dropped.
During the same time period, 45% of deans also saw a drop in applications from within the EU, though just 15% reported that the decline was ‘significant’. The majority (54%) of deans said applications from within the EU had remained the same.
For those business schools that have MBA programs, the report revealed a less marked decline, with 39% of respondents indicating a significant lowering in MBA applications from outside of the EU. Still, around 74% of deans said non-EU MBA applications had declined overall.
For MBA applications within the EU, an overwhelming 74% of representatives said applications had remained the same, with 11% reporting a significant decline and 26% experiencing declines overall.
The findings follow a number of high profile international visa measures that have been either proposed or implemented by the UK government over the past two years.
Earlier this summer, the recently elected Labour government confirmed it would retain the UK dependent visa ban, implemented in January 2024, which restricts international students from bringing their families with them to the UK while they study. Experts warned against the move citing fears it would undermine the UK’s competitiveness and reduce the country’s appeal to international students.
In May 2024, the popular two-year Graduate Route visa appeared to be in the firing line, with the previous Conservative government arguing it was being used by migrants as a backdoor into the country by taking “low quality” courses in order to enter low paid jobs. This theory was later dismissed by an independent review that recommended the Graduate Route be kept.
The CABS report indicates that the drop in non-EU applications has been most pronounced in Nigeria. Across all program types, including undergraduate degrees, 24 deans said applications from Nigeria had fallen. India was also significant, with 21 institutions experiencing a drop in numbers of applicants. A further 10 deans had seen applications from China fall.
