Foreign students could be a great revenue stream for Olds College and a win-win for those students and the economy, according to Education Minister David Eggen and Olds College president Stuart Cullum.
Eggen and Cullum made those comments as Cullum guided Eggen on a tour of the college and Olds High School on July 28.
Eggen said bringing foreign students into places like Olds College could provide another revenue stream for the campus during the summer when most other students are away.
He said it also provides opportunities for those students to improve their English and learn about another country. They may be impressed enough to come back again ñ perhaps even eventually live here.
"We know you have residential space here in the summer that perhaps we can utilize more ñ setting up more language programs and so forth for people who want to acquire English as a second language," he said.
"The sky's the limit, right? I mean, new president and our government, we want to make sure we have a close relationship with the community.
"As part of building tourism and together with education, we just have new, direct flights from Beijing, China and Mexico City and we know both of those markets are growing rapidly," Eggen added.
"We know that the international language market is growing rapidly too and Olds has awesome residences here that we could potentially market for summer language programs in the future."
Cullum said the college agrees there's great potential there, but takes the long view.
"We don't view those as one-off opportunities," he said. "I mean, they're good opportunities to have those individuals come to Alberta and Canada.
"Often they come because of the opportunity in our industries, like agriculture. So they'll come, they do their language training, and sometimes they'll stay, sometimes they'll leave and come back. But either way, they become potential partners for us internationally, which is good for our economy.
"And if they stay, we have a connection to an international market. So I think the value in those kinds of programs is more than just one-off. I think they're long-term value," he said.
Eggen agreed, stressing the fact international students can directly or indirectly spur the economy.
"If they take programming here, you get international students. Mom and dad come to visit and then they go on a holiday, and the whole thing just goes like that," he said.
Eggen said the election of Donald Trump as U.S. president and the concern his policies are having among international students is also an advantage for Canadian post-secondary institutions like Olds College.
"People are taking second skeptical glances at American colleges that offer that kind of language programming because people have different feelings about America recently," Eggen said.
"And we can say, ëhey, Olds College, wow, is it ever nice ñ and super stable, super safe, close to an airport. We can have summer language programming here."
"Mom and dad come to visit and then they go on a holiday, and the whole thing just goes like that."DAVID EGGEN EDUCATION MINISTER
