Education Diplomacy & Alumni Networks

Founded under the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt, the library and its associated research institute supported scholars working on mathematics, astronomy, medicine and geography, funded by the state specifically to attract talent from beyond Egypt's borders.

The monastic university in present-day Bihar drew thousands of monks and students from China, Korea, Tibet and South East Asia, who travelled overland and by sea to study philosophy, logic, medicine and astronomy for the best part of a millennium.

Missions carrying monks and students to Chang'an studied Chinese law, administration, Buddhism and writing systems over some two centuries, transmitting institutions and ideas that shaped Japanese statecraft and culture during the Nara and Heian periods.

The institution, founded by a wealthy merchant's daughter, grew into a centre of learning that drew scholars from across North Africa and Muslim Spain and is regarded by some historians as the oldest existing degree-granting university in the world.

Widely regarded as the oldest continuously operating university in the Western world, Bologna attracted students from across Europe, who organised themselves by nation of origin to negotiate rights and privileges with the city, an early institutional model for managing large-scale foreign student populations.

A bequest from the mining magnate's fortune funded scholarships bringing students, initially from the British Empire, the United States and Germany, to study at Oxford, making it one of the oldest and most prominent international scholarship schemes, though one later scrutinised for its colonial-era origins.

Washington used part of the reparations owed after the 1900 Boxer Rebellion to fund Chinese students studying in America instead, a decision that led to the founding of a preparatory school in Beijing that later became Tsinghua University.

Following the Second World War, student exchanges grew in popularity, motivated by the aim of increasing participants' understanding and tolerance of other cultures. They were also promoted as a means of improving language skills and broadening social horizons, establishing the modern rationale for the capability.

Senator J. William Fulbright's legislation used proceeds from the sale of surplus war property to fund international academic exchange, establishing a model of using government funds for two-way scholarly mobility that many other countries later copied.

Agreed by Commonwealth foreign ministers meeting in Ceylon, the plan funded technical training and university places for students from newly independent Asian countries, becoming one of the first large multilateral vehicles for South-facing academic exchange rather than purely colonial patterns of study.

The scheme funded students to spend part of their degree studying at a university in another member state, and it grew over subsequent decades into one of the world's largest state-funded mobility programmes, later renamed Erasmus+ and widened to non-European partners.

The close of the Cold War brought a further increase in student exchange activity as barriers to movement between blocs fell. This widened the pool of participating countries and institutions available for partnership.

The state scholarship scheme, which funds thousands of international students each year at Turkish universities, drew large numbers of applicants from Africa, Central Asia and the Balkans, part of Ankara's wider use of higher education as a soft-power tool.

An immigration white paper proposed shortening the Graduate visa route that allows international students to work after finishing their degrees, part of a broader push to reduce net migration that alarmed universities reliant on overseas tuition fees.

The State Department increased vetting of student visa applicants, including scrutiny of social media activity, and briefly terminated the immigration status of a number of students before some terminations were reversed following legal challenges.

Ottawa maintained restrictions on new study permits first introduced in 2024 as part of its multi-year immigration levels plan, reducing overall intake and disproportionately affecting applicants from India, which had supplied the largest share of the country's international students.

At the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation summit in Beijing in September, China announced further training and scholarship commitments for African students and officials, continuing a pipeline that has made it one of the continent's largest hosts of international students.

More institutions adopted Collaborative Online International Learning formats, pairing classes with partner universities overseas for joint projects conducted remotely, a lower-cost complement to physical mobility that grew fastest where travel costs or visa barriers were highest.

Building on rule changes that let overseas universities operate directly in India, additional foreign institutions moved to open campuses in hubs such as Gujarat's GIFT City, an alternative to sending students abroad that the government actively encouraged.

More overseas universities opened or expanded branch campuses in Gulf education hubs such as Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Riyadh, part of a strategy to build regional higher-education centres and reduce reliance on scholarships that send students abroad.

After a proposed legislative cap on international enrolments failed to pass parliament, the government instead used higher application fees and stricter assessment of applicants' financial and academic credentials to slow growth in student numbers.

Brussels widened access to its Erasmus+ mobility programme for Ukrainian universities and individuals displaced by the war, funding places at institutions across the bloc and supporting new partnerships between Ukrainian and European universities.

A group of American students travelling in Guatemala on a college-sponsored trip were robbed, harassed and threatened near Santa Lucía Cotzumalguapa, and five of the young women were raped. The incident highlighted the security risks institutions assume when sending students abroad.