The secret probe into university facing foreign student allegations

The country’s higher education watchdog is probing an Australian university accused of aggressively poaching foreign students from other institutions and for having lax recruitment practices and low English standards for admissions.

Documents obtained by this masthead reveal Torrens University is under scrutiny from the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency after the agency became concerned by the university’s recruitment of international students and a rapid increase in its enrolments.

Universities have moved to cancel international student enrolments.Credit: Brook Mitchell

The correspondence also reveals multiple Australian universities enrolled students who were later found to have provided fake documents in their applications, as part of systemic fraud occurring in Haryana state in northern India.

The documents, released under freedom of information laws, show TEQSA has launched a compliance assessment into Torrens to determine whether the university is still meeting the standards required to remain registered.

Torrens, which has campuses in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide, has been the subject of 12 complaints since 2022. The watchdog said this was a “large number” for one institution.

Among the allegations made by complainants was that Torrens pushes education agents to poach from other providers, offering a 35 per cent fee discount for onshore international students.

Separately, an unnamed NSW public university alleged Torrens’ agents had been involved in unethical behaviour and were actively encouraged to poach its students by promising large discounts and other incentives.

Another complainant alleged high visa refusal rates were driven by “corrupt behaviour” in markets such as India, and that Torrens sales staff had made decisions related to student admissions.

The documents also revealed allegations that staff who raised concerns about the practices were forced to resign or had their employment terminated.

A Torrens spokesman said staff were bound by its code of conduct and undertook regular mandatory compliance training, while recruitment agents were also bound by stringent requirements.

“We would terminate – and have done so – any contract where an agent was found to be in breach,” he said.

The ongoing probe into the university’s practices comes as the federal government pushes ahead with a major crackdown on foreign student numbers. Education Minister Jason Clare said “shonks and crooks” were undermining the international education sector.

The government late last year changed its visa processing system to prioritise higher education providers deemed the least risk of recruiting “non-genuine” students, those who come to Australia primarily to work, not study.

University risk ratings from the Department of Home Affairs were updated in April. Federation University, the University of New England and the University of Tasmania were all given level 3 grade, the lowest category. Torrens University remained a level 2 provider.

‘Sudden and significant’ increase in enrolments

The watchdog wrote to Torrens in January last year concerned about its “sudden and significant increase” in international students

“TEQSA is concerned about the risk that students may lack the academic preparation and proficiency in English required to participate in their intended study,” the letter reads.

“The significant increases, particularly from new and existing source countries such as Laos, Kenya, Ghana and Nepal, also raises concerns about the measures taken by [Torrens] to ensure that student agents are only recruiting genuine students.

“In addition, we have identified a number of agents engaged by [the university] who had high visa refusal rates in 2022 and in previous years. This raises material concerns about the efficacy of the agent monitoring framework.”

In July 2023, TEQSA was concerned enough about the university’s practices that it moved to launch a compliance assessment, which is still under way.

It also wrote to at least one other university in 2023, expressing concern over its recruitment practices and formally requesting further information, the documents reveal.

Former TEQSA chief commissioner Professor Peter Coaldrake wrote to universities and colleges in August, warning them of their obligations when recruiting, admitting and supporting overseas students. He revealed the regulator was investigating several institutions’ risk of non-compliance.

However, TEQSA has refused to reveal if those investigations led to compliance assessments into other universities’ practices. Compliance assessments can begin only when the regulator identifies “serious compliance risks”.

Widespread fraudulent applications

The documents separately reveal multiple universities – who were not identified – were in contact with TEQSA in 2022 and 2023, concerned about admissions fraud in Haryana state.

One university informed TEQSA in October it had determined there was systemic fraud in applications coming out of the region. It said students had been using fake academic documents and fake employment records.

It discovered the fraud only after the students were enrolled. This was after it was known that too many applicants from the region were “non-genuine” temporary entrants.

Former Department of Immigration deputy secretary Abul Rizvi said that while smaller operators had been the target of much of the government’s visa crackdown, larger Group of Eight institutions, such as the University of Sydney, needed more scrutiny.

He believes the increase in foreign student admissions has affected universities’ ability to deliver high-quality degrees.

“If I was sending my child to another country to get an overseas education, the last thing I’d want was for my child to be studying in a class full of students from the same country,” he said.

The Torrens spokesman said it closely managed its recruitment of international students, who make up 48 per cent of its cohort, and that it was proud to have maintained a level 2 risk rating.

“Our offshore international student enrolments grew in 2022 compared to 2019 – as borders re-opened post the COVID pandemic. However, this was substantially offset by a decline in onshore international student enrolments,” he said.

“We believe in student choice, and Torrens University works hard to offer a highly competitive and high-quality educational experience with small class sizes, individualised support and an innovative curriculum, that is competitively priced for international students.”