It is estimated that Brussels currently has about 110,000 students in higher education institutions subsidised by the Communities and the Federal Government. Approximately one in four is a student in international mobility. Despite the (numerical) importance of this subgroup, knowledge about these students is relatively limited. With this project, Brik (the service desk for students at a Dutch-speaking institution for higher education in Brussels) wished to gain insight into the issue of international students in Brussels in order to better substantiate its policy.
The knowledge about international students in Brussels is fragmentary and for certain aspects also lacking. The project aims to remedy this by:
- a) developing a ‘scorecard’ on international students in Brussels, based on the available quantitative and qualitative data, in order to gain insight into the existing knowledge.
- b) filling in gaps in the existing knowledge by
– conducting an online survey of international students in Brussels
– conducting focus groups with international students in order to further clarify the results of the survey
– holding focus groups with policy makers within higher education institutions in order to gain a better insight into the (desired) use of data concerning international students”.