Back in August, we took an in-depth look at how the US election and government policy may influence students’ decision to study in the US.
This week, IDP Education released their 2024 Pre-election Survey, giving us a quick glimpse at current attitudes among international students as we edge closer to polling day.
The outlook for 2024
In IDP’s 2021 post-election survey, 67% of international students said they were more likely to study in the US following Biden’s presidential victory.
Comparatively, responses to the 2024 pre-election survey found 54% of respondents said the election outcome would have no influence on their choice to study in the US.
Of the total 916 respondents, just 35% stated the election may influence their decision, from slightly to significantly. Among this 35%, more than half (57%) had a preference for Kamala Harris to come out on top.
Survey respondents were 52.1% male and 47.5% female. Among women, 62% expressed a preference for Harris to win the election, with just 38% favouring Donald Trump. On the other hand, the response among men was more evenly split, with 51% in favour of a Harris victory and 49% in favour of Trump.
Interestingly, when asked how aware of the country’s politics they were, 44% of respondents stated they only knew ‘a little bit about US politics’, while 26% said they are ‘generally aware of US politics’, 18% ‘[didn’t] follow US politics at all’, and 12% claimed to ‘follow US politics closely’.
Speaking about the results of the survey, IDP Connect CEO, Simon Emmett said:
‘Regardless of the election outcome, many international students have lifelong goals of studying in the US – demonstrating the strong brand of US institutions globally.
‘Encouragingly for the US sector, our survey showed that recent policy changes in Canada, UK and Australia have prompted new students – up to a quarter of respondents – to also consider the US as a top destination.’
