Victor Ezeja
AdminIt has emerged that no fewer than 10,000 Nigerians have been granted admissions to study in Australian universities between 2015 and 2019 with the number growing from 400 that was initially the number of those admitted.
This was disclosed by the Deputy High Commissioner of the Australian High Commission in Nigeria, Matthew Mechan at an education fair organised in Lagos to celebrate educational links between both countries, as well as promote opportunities offered by Australia’s tertiary institutions to Nigerian students.
According to the deputy head of mission, Australia had a target of restoring the growth index for more Nigerian students to study in Australia’s adventurous and relaxed learning environment.
“If we can get back to adding a couple of more hundreds of students each year, that will be great. We know that we offer something incredibly different from other countries,” he said.
Mechan further pointed out that Australia had produced several successful graduates who returned to Nigeria and were making positive impacts, developing various sectors.
“I recall in 2015, that year we only had 400 people, but after our first fair, we added 1,000 new students. So, we got up to 1,400 students in a space of one year. And that slowly grew over time with a couple of hundred each year.
“So, I guess if you pull all those numbers together, I will think probably since 2015 we will be getting not less than 10,000 Nigerians who have had the chance to study in Australia,” he said.
The envoy urged Nigerians who want different kinds of quality education in a relaxed environment to consider Australia, stressing that his country was a fun place to live and study.
“Our lifestyle is very different, it is very relaxed. We are a nice and warm country. We have unique wildlife and a great lifestyle, by the beach or things like that, that maybe you don’t get in those other countries, which are a bit colder,” he said.
According to him, consistently, Australian cities like Melbourne have been rated first or second most livable cities on the planet by the Economist for the last decade.
“The High Commission itself has been around since independence but for the Education Fair, specifically we actually did the first one back in 2015 and we were doing them once a year until 2019 and unfortunately it got stopped,” said the envoy.
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