100,000 Chinese students expected to study in Australia stranded

Nearly 60 per cent of Chinese university students who were expected to study in Australia this year are still overseas.

Nearly 100,000 Chinese students expected to study in Australia are still overseas. Picture: AP

Nearly 100,000 Chinese university students who were expected to study in Australia this year are still overseas with nearly all feared to be stranded in China by the coronavirus travel ban.

After checking immigration data federal officials told universities that 98,000 people with Chinese student visas were still offshore, with only 58,000 onshore.

Dan Tehan. Picture: AAP

Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan said on Tuesday that the government and the education sector were committed to giving maximum flexibility to students caught overseas to ensure they can continue their studies.

“We’re doing everything we can to ensure they can either study online or study remotely,” he said.

Mr Tehan also released figures indicating that, when the whole tertiary education sector (including vocational education courses) is taken into account, even more Chinese students are still offshore.

He said that of the 189,000 Chinese students in tertiary education, 56 per cent are still offshore and 44 per cent are in Australia.

The situation was worsened by the date of the Chinese New Year celebrations on January 25, which attracted many students back to China to be with their families.

Mr Tehan said the government would not yet discuss the economic impact from Chinese students unable to come to Australia to study.

“Obviously we have to wait and see the length and the extent of the coronavirus,” he said.