Foreign university student total doubles in 10 years

The number of foreign students at Dutch universities and HBO or higher professional education colleges has doubled to 81,000 over the past 10 years, according to a report by Nuffic, the Dutch institute for the internationalisation of education, reports Dutch News.

In the 2016-17 academic year, a record 112,000 international students attended Dutch higher education institutions. Of them, 81,000 are taking a full degree course, while the remainder came for shorter stays, largely exchange programmes, Nuffic said.

The good quality of Dutch education, the large number of English-language courses and the relatively low costs were the major reasons most foreign students opted for the Netherlands, Nuffic said. A total of 164 nationalities were represented, making the student population even more diverse. The highest number of students came from Germany with 22,000 students, followed by China (4,300) and Italy (3,300). Many international students stay to live and work in the Netherlands after they have graduated.
Full report on the Dutch News site