I pay $10,000-a-year to study at university and I could get into a lot of trouble for what I have to say… but it NEEDS to be said

Aussies have taken aim at universities for accepting international students who don’t speak a word of English, claiming it is negatively affecting their grades.

Peter James Cruz is in the second year of his engineering degree at the University of Sydney and claims he has had to ‘carry’ multiple group assignments and ‘do damage control on most’ because his peers don’t speak the same language.

‘It is a big problem, especially with groups that you can’t allocate yourself,’ he said.

‘I know that translators are more advanced now, but they are only a crutch to an ever-growing problem in my eyes, and cannot replace knowing the language.’

Universities have long been accused of having an addiction to Chinese students, who pay billions of dollars each year to earn prestigious degrees in Australia.

Mr Cruz, 19, is an Australian citizen and forks out $10,000 a year for his degree, however an international student can be charged as much as $60,000.

The high numbers of Chinese students has influenced how some classes are delivered with the University of Melbourne called out in August for teaching tutorials in Mandarin and alienating Australian students as a result. 

In one instance, Mr Cruz said he was placed in a group with a student who didn’t speak English and who used ChatGPT to write their part of the assignment.

Mr Cruz had to rewrite their contribution himself because the university doesn’t allow students to use AI to complete assignments, although that is set to change next year.

‘It did create more work for me as I had to check through the ChatGPT responses. This did force some drastic fixes which did limit the grade,’ he said.

The government raised the English language requirements for international students in March.

The minimum test score for a student visa was increased from International English Language Testing System (IELTS) score 5.5, to a 6 out of 9.

A level 6 English speaker is considered ‘competent,’ while level 7 is ‘good,’ and level 8 is ‘very good.’

But students say the changes are trivial and there must be a better way to ensure that international students with a poor grasp of English don’t become a drag on their classmates.

Mr Cruz emphasised that it wasn’t a matter of racial discrimination, but of a ‘minority’ of international students who didn’t have the English skills to do the work properly.

Another student at the university, who is in his third year of studying mechatronic engineering, said poor English among his peers was ‘still a major issue.’

‘I’ve had group work projects where the rest of the group were speaking Mandarin the entire time and didn’t switch to English when I asked them to,’ he said.

‘The IELTS requirement is still really low in my opinion. A change from 5.5 to 6 is basically trivial. I certainly can’t see any evidence that the change did anything.’

An international student who was doing a Bachelor of IT described his group assignments as ‘absolute hell’.

‘The majority of my group members can barely construct a coherent written message and use ChatGPT to basically copy and paste whatever it says for their part,’ he said.

‘Even though I am an international student myself, I feel like many of the students are just accepted for the money they will pay through fees with absolutely zero regard for their language English skills.

‘It not only creates this barrier between them and what they need to learn during their courses, but completely ruins your education as well since you have to do the majority of the work.’

In response to questions, a University of Sydney spokesperson said its English requirements were in fact higher than those set by the government in March.

‘Our English language standards are among the highest in the sector and well above the minimum set by government, with our courses typically requiring an IELTS of between 6.5 and 7.5 which we believe is appropriate.’

The university was also committed to ‘supporting our international students as they adapt to life in Sydney,’ with language and learning support available to any students who might need it, the spokesperson said.

‘We encourage our students to use generative AI productively and responsibly for the purpose of boosting learning, with guardrails in place to protect academic integrity, so our students are prepared for a world where this technology is part of everyday life and work.’

The university announced on Wednesday that, from the first semester of 2025, students will be allowed to use AI for assessments, except in tests and exams. 

A spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs said it was not considering further changes to English language requirements.

‘The requirement for students to have a minimum English language test score of IELTS 6.0, or equivalent, provides the level of English language skills required to succeed in tertiary academic studies,’ the spokesperson said.

‘Students with strong English proficiency are better placed to live independently and engage with the broader community.’ 

International students accounted for more than a quarter of all enrolments in Australia in 2022 with 450,000 foreigners paying fees directly.

The fees of these international students contributed a fifth of all university funding and made up Australia’s fourth largest ‘export’ – education – after iron ore, coal and natural gas.

In August, the Albanese Government  announced it would trim the country’s intake of international students by nearly 20,000 – or around seven per cent – as the their influx was blamed for the explosion in house prices and rents.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare said the government would set international student commencements at 270,000 for the 2025 calendar year.

China is Australia’s biggest source of international students, but a report released by Mr Clare earlier this year hinted that Australia could diversify away from China and towards India, which last year overtook China to be the world’s most populous nation.