From 7th-13th July, Daniel Zheng, MD of HOPE and Alexandra Wen, GM of HOPE Shanghai visited seven institutions across Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia to explore more opportunities for both clients and HOPE itself after the traditional study abroad destinations are experiencing a decline in China market, while Southeast Asian countries, Japan, HK are absorbing more and more interest from Chinese families. Particularly, some UK and Australia TNE(Trans-National Education) institutions in Singapore and Malaysia showcase their advantage with their trackable reputation, coherent, fast-track and cost-effective pathway programme.  

In Singapore, HOPE team first visited PSB Academy. PSB compresses a bachelor’s degree into 31 months from junior school entry and feeds directly into master’s programme. Thirty-year-operation, with 29,000 total enrollments and with the national Skills Future subsidy for 50+ senior citizens, demonstrates its professional model for international education.  

The second stop, Curtin Singapore campus (QS 174) offers the same 24-month bachelor’s degree, but it adds six-campus mobility within the Curtin network, and it has an AACSB-accredited business school to attract both local and international students mainly from Asia.

The last school HOPE visited is Amity Global Institute. As a leading Asian education brand, the Institute offers international students direct pathways to British and Australian universities. Accredited by Singapore's EduTrust, the institute focuses on small-class teaching and vocational training-oriented courses, which help students seamlessly connect to overseas degrees.

In summary, the Singaporean higher education institution function as an ‘higher education accelerator’ where foreign universities can plug into Singapore education system without building full onshore infrastructure. Meanwhile the British and Australian degrees are offered with low cost and high flexibility.

In Malaysia, HOPE team visited two universities: Heriot-Watt University Malaysia Campus (QS 256) and Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI), and two international schools: Fairview International School (IB) and Sri KDU school (A level).

Heriot-Watt Malaysia campus replicates the UK curriculum on a flagship green campus in Putrajaya, which marks a three-year bachelor’s plus one-year master’s degree. This curriculum cuts total cost by more than 40 % compared with the UK campus.

Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI), Malaysia’s only national teacher-training university, runs 1+3.5, 1+2.5 and 1+1 pathways up to PhD level. It has already operated customized summer and winter camps for teachers from China and other south-eastern countries. This can serve as a applicable model for other foreign universities.

Apart from the higher education sectors in Malaysia, HOPE also visited 2 international schools. Faireview International School in Malaysia, which is also a three-time winner of the ‘Best IB School in Malaysia’, can offer a two-day trial classes free of charge and packages them with local travel for parents. The trial lessons can serve as a taster of the IB curriculum for Chinese parents who are not familiar with international education.

While Faireview International School offers IB curriculum, XCL Education’s Sri KDU campus delivers a seamless British curriculum from Year 7 to A-level with boarding options. Both schools have turned ‘experience-based recruitment’ into a mature supply chain, and the fee, compared with that of British private schools, particularly with VAT added, is much competitive.  

Finally in Jakarta, Indonesia, HOPE visited two local agents and two schools. The visits to the local agents marked the beginning of HOPE’s expansion of students recruitment channels in Southeast Asia. At one agent, HOPE even organized a pre-departure briefing for four Indonesian students who had successfully applied to the University of Nottingham Ningbo (UNNC) Summer School through HOPE. They were about to embark on their journey to Ningbo, China. At the same time, some students also expressed their interest in applying UK institutions via HOPE.

Similarly, at Chong Mian School (K12 ) and Dongbo Institute (offer high education diploma), HOPE also discussed with the principal the possibility of linking the two schools with Chinese and UK institutions for both summer course and degree programme.