New Zealand universities are pinning their pandemic recovery hopes on an early 2021 return of international students, after the government ruled out a relaxation of border restrictions this year.
Before the pandemic, some 117,000 foreign students had arrived in the country each year.
Educators are frustrated at their inability to recruit foreign students despite their country’s well-regarded management of the COVID-19 crisis. The government enhanced the country’s reputation with foreign students by establishing a hardship fund for them and granting them eligibility for a national wage subsidy programs, while suppressing the pandemic more successfully than any other education destination.
