6.1% increase in overseas students for 2004/05

In 2004/05, the total number of students domiciled from countries outside of the UK increased by 6.1 per cent from 300,055 to 318,400. The previous year-on-year increase was 9.0 per cent.

The number of students from the European Union³ increased by 3.2 per cent from 96,845 to 100,005. This growth is largely attributed to the countries that acceded to the EU on 1 May 2004. The accession countries saw an increase of 53.3 per cent of students studying in the UK from 7,300 to 11,190.

The number of students from states that were EU members prior to 1 May 2004 decreased by 0.8 per cent to 88,815. Cyprus continued to be the largest contributor of students from the new member states (5,675 students), whilst Polish students more than doubled in number, from 965 to 2,185.

Table 1 - Number of other Europe students by top ten countries of domicile 2004/05

Countries outside of the current European Union but within the European geographic region are listed on the left with the percentage change in student numbers from 2003/04. Norway is the biggest contributor of such students to the UK.

Albania displays the largest growth at 26.1 per cent. However, this should be considered in the context of the small numbers of students involved, 190 in 2003/04 and 235 in 2004/05.

Bulgaria and Romania are timetabled to join the EU in January 2007.

Table 2 - Number of students by country of domicile outside of Europe (top 10) 2003/04 and 2004/05

The table shows China maintaining its position as the number one contributor of overseas students to the UK. These numbers have grown by 10.3 per cent since 2003/04. The increase between 2002/03 and 2003/04 was 35.8 per cent.

Indian student numbers increased by 14.1 per cent and Nigerian students 37.1 per cent. The number of Malaysian students dropped by 2.8 per cent.

Subject of study

Business and administrative studies retained its status as the most popular subject group among first degree students in 2004/05 - 12.4 per cent of students chose programmes of study within this group. Social studies, at 9.5 per cent, was the next most popular subject group at this level. Biological sciences and creative arts & design were third with 9.0 per cent.

This trend is not dissimilar to 2003/04 when business and administrative studies was also the most popular subject group at 12.5 per cent. However, this did mark a 1 percentage point fall from 13.5 per cent in 2002/03. The proportion of students studying social studies has increased by 0.5 percentage points moving this group to second most popular, from third.

The data is published in HESA’s annual report Students in Higher Education Institutions 2004/05, out this month, and is summarised in the table below.

Table 3 - Students by subject area and level of study 2003/04 and 2004/05, percentages

The subjects with the least number of first degree students remained as in 2003/04: mathematical sciences (1.9 per cent), agriculture and related subjects (0.6 per cent) and veterinary science (0.3 per cent).

Notes to editors

1. Press enquiries should be directed to:
   
   • HESA Press Officer
   • 01242 211133
   • [email protected]
   • 95 Promenade, Cheltenham, GL50 1HZ.
2. Rounding strategy

   Due to the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998, HESA implements a strategy in published and released tabulations designed to prevent the disclosure of personal information about any individual. These tabulations are derived from the HESA non-statutory populations and may differ slightly from those published by related statutory bodies. This strategy involves rounding all numbers to the nearest 5. A summary of this strategy is as follows:

   • 0, 1, 2 are rounded to 0
   • All other numbers are rounded to the nearest 5.

   So for example 3 is represented as 5, 22 is represented as 20, 3286 is represented as 3285 while 0, 20, 55, 3510 remain unchanged.

3. In the 2003/04 HESA Student Dataset the countries that acceded to the European Union on 1 May 2004 are not categorised as being part of the EU as they joined after the dataset’s reference date. However, for the purposes of comparison, the EU in this press release includes all of the EU countries as at 1 May 2004 for both 2004/05 and 2003/04 data. The EU countries are: Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Ireland, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and The Netherlands.
4. Numbers reported under supplementary subject information are within, and not additional to, the overall total, but are disaggregated from it on a different pattern from the 19 subject areas.
5. The HESA reference volume Students in Higher Education Institutions 2004/05 is an annual publication. The product is available to the public from HESA Customer Services, telephone 01242 211155 for more information.
6. Table 4 below, shows the underlying data from Table 3 above.

Table 4 - Students by subject area and level of study 2003/04 and 2004/05

Ends