Overseas students who apply for Australian student visa are assessed under the Simplified Student Visa Framework (SSVF).
Under the simplified student visa framework, which came into effect in July 2016, each country and each Commonwealth Register of Institutions and Courses for Overseas Students (CRICOS) registered education provider is allocated an immigration risk rating.
Provider and country immigration risk ratings are then combined to guide financial and English evidentiary requirements for student visa applicants.
On Friday 31st March, Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) will be updating the immigration risk ratings for countries and education providers. This will occur every six months with next update likely to be in September 2017.
Where risk ratings have changed, the evidence required for English language capability and financial capacity may also change.
Department made this announcement on their .
However, this rating will not be published. DIBP says, “To reduce the likelihood of unintended market impacts and the targeting of certain education providers by non-genuine students, the immigration risk ratings of education providers and countries will not be published. The online document checklist tool will advise a student of their likely financial and English language requirements prior to visa lodgement, based on their passport country and intended education provider.”
To check what type of evidence, an applicant will need to provide for student visa application, visit:
Immigration risk ratings are calculated using a weighted average based on the total number of international students (applicants and holders of student visas) that have a confirmation of enrolment (CoE) based on their principal course of study from the education provider.
The following weightings and immigration risk indicators are used to calculate the immigration risk rating of each education provider and country under the SSVF:
- rate of visa cancellations (25 per cent weighting)
- rate of refusals due to a fraud reason where the applicant lodged overseas (40 per cent weighting)
- rate of refusals (excluding fraud) where the applicant lodged overseas (10 per cent weighting)
- rate of student visa holders becoming unlawful non-citizens (15 per cent weighting)
- rate of Subsequent Protection Visa applications (10 per cent weighting).
As at 31 December 2016 there were 355,755 student visa holders in Australia. This is the highest recorded number of student visa holders in Australia in any year at 31 December. Over one third of students in Australia at 31 December 2016 were from China (19.9 per cent) or India (14.7 per cent).
