College is to spend €200,000 on a recruitment drive in a bid to increase the number of students from China who choose to attend Trinity.
The tender for services, published today, calls for a vendor to “provide student recruitment support services based in China”, with the services comprising “legal, financial and infrastructural resources to support up to (two ) full time staff members”.
The staff, who would receive a 12-month contract with an option for College to extend, are to act as student recruitment officers and advisors.
In a statement to the Irish Times in relation to the impact of Covid-19 on the recruitment drive, a spokesperson for College said that “the Covid 19 crisis continues to evolve and is impacting Trinity and its staff and students in many, complex ways. At this point it is too early, however to predict whether, or to what extent, it will have an impact on student recruitment in this area”.
There are currently around 500 Chinese students studying at Trinity, according to the spokesperson.
A tender for services published elsewhere on Wednesday details College’s “ongoing need for Education Consultant Services in order to respond to these strategic internationalisation objectives through developing a presence in overseas markets such as China”.
In 2019, College launched a new Global Relations Strategy focused on diversifying Trinity’s student population. One of its key goals is to increase the number of students from 18,000 to 21,000 by 2024. The strategy also outlines College’s plan to increase Trinity’s international population in order that 30-35% of Trinity students come from outside of Ireland by 2025.
In the 2018/2019 academic year, College spent over €1.4m on efforts to recruit non-EU undergraduate and postgraduate students according to figures released to Trinity News under the Freedom of Information Act 2014, an increase of around €300,000 from the previous year. A spokesperson for College explained to Trinity News that the spending was on “essential activities for the College in continuing to grow Trinity’s global connectivity and campus diversity”.
From January 2017 to July 2019, Trinity’s global relations department spent €69,551 on sponsored Facebook and Instagram posts. The majority of this expenditure was comprised of advertisements on Facebook for international recruitment events and promotions of specific postgraduate study and specific courses.
