Chinese students are important to Australian universities

Chinese international students are a valued part of Australia’s tertiary education system, their contribution to our society is both economically and culturally important.

The University of Sydney has always been a place that welcomes people from other nations, our teaching, learning, research and campus life are all enhanced in countless ways by our students from China and the 130 other countries that make up our student community.

Tertiary institutions around the world also recognise the value of an international student body. Twenty percent of Harvard’s students are from outside the United States and more than 60 per cent of the University of Oxford’s graduate student body is from outside of the United Kingdom.

Why is diversity on campus so important? Because the jobs of the future will require our students to be global citizens - to live, work and study with people from across the globe. By providing our students with that experience in the classroom, we are equipping them not just with the technical knowledge but also with the skills for collaboration, invention and influence that will be vital for their future careers.

We now live in the Asian Century, where Australia’s future economic prosperity is inexorably linked to Asia. China is our largest trading partner, six of Australia’s top trading partners are in Asia and over the next decade the Chinese economy is projected to add one million new jobs to Australia’s services sectors. Our graduates need to be Asia literate and understand the region in which we live.

International students from across Asia are helping Australian students better understand the region. Our graduates are already demonstrating the value of cross-cultural communication and competency.

Steven Bai, originally from Dalian in China and a recent graduate from the Faculty of Architecture Design and Planning, together with fellow alumnus Sam Johnson created the TetraBIN. The interactive bins promote the responsible disposal of rubbish by making the act of putting rubbish into a bin seem like a game. They featured at Vivid Sydney, won the 2014 Sydney Design Awards and were exhibited in 2015 Beijing Design Week. The bins are now being rolled out across Sydney, New York and Shanghai.

TetraBIN is a team made up of Australian and Chinese alumni, designing an innovative product to help drive sustainability. This is the future of work in our globalized economy and a great example of the benefits our international students have on our community.

Australian students too recognize the growing importance of China for their futures, increasingly our students are choosing to spend time living, studying and working in China while they complete their degrees at the University of Sydney.

Currently, the university has student mobility agreements with 289 partner universities from 42 countries. Of those countries, China is the top destination for outbound mobility students from the University of Sydney.

The trend is seen across Australia, for example the Australian government’s New Colombo Plan has supported 4700 students to live, work and study in China, making it the second-most popular destination for scholars and mobility students after Indonesia.

Our students are choosing to undertake short field trips to Suzhou, or complete a law subject at the East China University of Political Science and Law or undertake a semester-long Chinese-language program at Peking University because they understand that much like the Australian economy, their own future prosperity lies firmly in Asia.

The reality is that Australia and China have different political values, our histories until recently have taken vastly different trajectories. But we share many aspirations: to cure cancer, to provide a decent healthcare system, to build better bridges, to battle poverty, to run efficient businesses, to equip students with better mathematical skills, and to maintain peace and stability.

While we ought never to surrender our core values as institutions, by taking students from countries throughout our region and the world we build capacity in such areas, we encourage dialogue around points of difference, we equip our domestic students for life in a complex world, and we create friends for Australia around the globe. Similarly, by engaging in research with our Chinese partners we work for the good of Australia, our region and the world. That is part of our purpose, and our responsibility, at the University of Sydney, and something of which we are enormously proud.

Dr Michael Spence is the Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Sydney in Australia.