07 Mar Standard 7: Overseas Student Transfers
Standard 7 Overseas Student Transfers – Under the Education Services for Overseas Students Act (ESOS Act 2000), Standard 7 of National Code 2018 states that for an overseas student to transfer to a different provider, prior to the overseas student completing six months of their principal course of study, they must be released from the current provider except in certain circumstances detailed in National Code of Practice for Providers of Education and Training to Overseas Students 2018. And registered providers must not knowingly enrol an overseas student wishing to transfer from another registered provider’s course prior to the overseas student completing six months of their principal course of study, except in certain circumstances as listed in the ESOS Act. For the school sector, a transfer cannot happen until after the first six months of the first registered school sector course.
As the principal course of study is generally the final course of study covered by the overseas student’s visa, transfer requirements apply to all courses of study prior to the overseas student’s principal course. The principal course is the main course of study to be undertaken by an overseas student where the student visa has been issued for multiple courses and is usually the final course of study. The first six months is calculated as six calendar months from the date an overseas student commences their principal course. This means the transfer restriction applies to a student during all courses they undertake prior to the principal course.
But still there have been many cases where students are in breach of Standard 7 Overseas Student Transfers and are still transferring to different provider, even after they have not been released by their current provider, leading to students breaching their visa conditions and concurrent enrolments. From compliance perspective, education providers should take care of two most important things to mitigate this. Providers should educate their students and education agents on student visa condition (specifically 8202, 8518, 8533 among all other visa conditions) including consequences of breaching those student visa conditions and education provider’s Overseas Student Transfer Policy and process.
Watch this video for what you need to be aware of, in order to ensure your compliance with the Standard 7 of the National Code 2018.
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