For many years I have published estimates of the domestic higher education participation rate at age 19. That age was chosen as it is the modal age of domestic higher education students.

To calculate a participation rate we need a count of domestic higher education students (Australian or NZ citizen, permanent resident) and a count of the ‘domestic’ population, that is all Australian or NZ citizens and permanent residents. There are significant issues with calculating both numbers – explained in this post from last year.

One of these issues is that the ABS population figures are inflated by temporary migrants. They need to be removed from the count to get a ‘domestic’ population figure. The ABS does not provide a temporary visa/domestic breakdown. As a workaround, my participation time series deducts international 19 year old higher education students from the ABS 19 year old population estimate.

A new methodology

This onshore higher education international students aged 19 correction, however, has several problems: a) the higher education enrolment data does not cover all higher education providers; b) vocational education students are not included; and c) other temporary visa holders in Australia are not included.

These omissions should lead to an under-estimate of the temporary visa population and, after their deduction, an over-estimate of the ‘domestic’ population.

To get a more accurate temporary population figure, I asked the Department of Home Affairs for data on 19 year old temporary visa holders in Australia on 30/06/2024, the date of the ABS population estimate. Some of these visa holders may not satisfy the population count rule – that the person is or will be in Australia for at least 12 months in a 16 month period. However, people with temporary visas who satisfy the 12/16 rule but who were temporarily absent from Australia on 30/06/2024 are omitted from the count.

The estimated 19 year old population on 30/06/2024 according to the ABS was 335,857. Australia that day had a temporary visa 19 year old population of 33,118. This included 24,866 international higher education students, 3,894 international vocational students, 3,224 working holiday visa holders, and 1,134 people on various other visas.

An estimated domestic participation rate

Deducting those visa holders from the ABS population figure gives an estimated ‘domestic’ population of 302,739. With 119,023 domestic 19 year olds that gives us an age 19 estimated participation rate of 39.3% in 2024.

Using the international student enrolment workaround, the Department of Education arrived at a 2024 participation rate of 40.2%.

While the 39.3%/40.2% participation percentages are similar, the difference is in the opposite direction to what I expected. More temporary visa holders deducted should produce a smaller ‘domestic’ population, and so a higher participation rate.

Timing of data

One reason for this counterintuitive result may be that the Home Affairs numbers are people in Australia who were aged 19 on a single date, 30/06/24, while the enrolment data is people enrolled at any time during 2024. Just under half of 2024 commencing international students began in the second half of the year.

I only have the 19 year old temporary visa holder international student population for Universities Australia member institutions, which was 32,467 in 2024. Non-UA members have about 17% of the total onshore international higher education market so the true number is likely to be non-trivially higher than the UA-only figure.

Therefore it is quite plausible that onshore 19 year old international higher education students enrolled at any time during 2024 exceeded my 30/06/2024 Home Affairs total of 33,118 temporary visa holders.

The timing issues mean that the workaround method of calculating temporary visa holders, using the international higher education student 19 year olds, may be a better proxy than I had assumed.

4 in 10

Calculating a participation rate is much harder than it looks.

But it is reasonable to say that the domestic higher education participation rate at age 19 in 2024 was about 4 in 10.