A Drop In Chinese Students Taking GMAT

Fewer Chinese citizens are taking the GMAT.

Financial Times reports that the number of exams submitted by Chinese candidates last year saw a 29% drop when compared to the number of reports submitted in 2014.

A Purge Of Foreign B-Schools

And the number could slip even further, based on a recent purchase of foreign university partnerships by the Chinese government.

China’s ministry of education sent out a warning earlier this month that it’s ordering 234 joint degrees and partnerships to be closed by the middle of July. FT reports that the decision includes

24 undergraduate and masters qualifications in business administration and finance that are affiliated with b-schools in Australia, the US, the UK, France and Russia.

US B-Schools Take A Hit

That follows a larger trend in the US b-schools, which are beginning to see a huge drop in international MBAs.

A P&Q analysis of US News data for the Class of 2019 found that of the schools ranked 21-51 in our latest ranking, 19 saw decreases in their international student enrollment from the year before.

At Texas A&M’s Mays Business School, the percentage of foreign students plunged from 33.1% to 19.7%. At the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business, the percentage dropped 11 points to 23.3%.

One potential reason for the drop may be the simple fact that US tuition is getting increasingly expensive.

In an interview with CNBC, Rohan Mishra – an MBA student at Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business – says he is counting on working in the US to make it easier to pay off his student debt.

“”Obviously it will be difficult because [of] the kind of salaries that we get in India, with the cost of living much lower than what we will get in the U.S.,” Mishra tells CNBC.

Another reason why international students may be shying away from a US education is President Trump’s restrictive views on immigration – and worries that they won’t be able to land a US-based job after graduation.

“Not having clarity about what the outcomes will be and what will happen when they exit business school is leading them to look at other options,” Sangeet Chowfla, CEO of GMAC, tells CNBC.

According to CNBC, the US government has approved drastically fewer H-1B visas in 2017 than the previous year. Furthermore, President Trump signed an executive order last April encouraging companies to “hire American.”

And for international students, they’re certainty not keeping their b-school options limited to the US.

“Students are saying, ‘I have options at this particular point in time. Do I need to only consider the U.S., or should I look at all these other places?'” Chowfla tells CNBC.

Sources: Financial Times, Poets & Quants, CNBC