Education Background of Chinese International St...
Chinese international students enrolled in the higher education of Australia can be categorised according to two large cohorts—those who completed their secondary education in Australia，and those who received their secondary education in China.[6]The different pathways undertaken by China’s younger generations before arrival at Australian universities will inevitably influence their knowledge structure and academic skills in differing ways.But in terms of their English proficiency and training in the humanities，some similar patterns for the two groups can be identified.Arguably，their academic abilities in these two aspects may not have met the average standards of Australian universities，although factors impacting the two groups vary.
The first group，also known as the onshore internationals，are those who come to Australia for secondary education and choose to stay in the country for their tertiary education.[7]According to an Australian Council for Educational Research report on the subject choice by students in year 12 in Australian secondary schools，students from a non-English speaking background“were more likely to study mathematics，physical sciences，economics and business...and students whose parents were born in Australia or another English-speaking country were more likely to study humanities and social sciences”(Fullarton and Ainley，2000:19).This pattern is understandable as Chinese or other international students，with lower English proficiency，are more likely to achieve better results in science，technology or economics subjects，which are less language dependent.[8]This subject choice preference results in the fact that onshore Chinese international students may have had limited training in the humanities before entering university.In terms of their English proficiency，although they have been studying at local high schools，they are treated as international students，and English is tested as an additional language as part of their ATAR[9]scores，or the overall academic merit of a student，for admission to university.As a result，the English requirements for these onshore internationals have been significantly lowered compared with local students，and therefore a question mark hangs over the English proficiency of this group，even though they have studied at Australian high schools.
The second group，also known as the offshore internationals，are those who have completed their secondary education in China’s mainland and choose to pursue tertiary study in Australia.Amongst the key reasons attracting China’s younger generations to Western countries like Australia as their overseas study destinations，“better educational resources and opportunities”often ranks at the top(Le，2017:75).It is widely known that secondary education in China features an exam-oriented system，which is believed to repress students’creativity and critical thinking capabilities(Zang，2011:1).Under such an exam-oriented education system，teaching and learning are primarily resultsdriven，and students lack training in critical thinking，because such a system rewards standardised correct answers rather than creative and critical thinking abilities.As a result，like their onshore peers，this group of Chinese international students may not have received proper training in the humanities before landing in Australia.As far as their English levels are concerned，although they do need to meet the various language requirementsset by different universities for different programs，Australian universities have been lowering English requirements in a bid to attract more full-fee-paying international students(McCrohon and Nyland，2018:24).If we take the most widely accepted English proficiency test，IELTS，for example，most Australian universities require international students to have an overall IELTSscore of 6.0 with no band lower than 5.5 for admission into undergraduate programs.According to the IELTSofficial website，an overall score of 6.0 suggests the test taker is a competent user who“has an efficient command of the language despite some inaccuracies，inappropriate usage and misunderstandings.”[10]Again，it is questionable whether the academic English of this group could meet the standards of Australian tertiary education，even though they have undertaken English language proficiency tests.