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The door is reopening to international students but not in the way it was pre-pandemic.
The Government is allowing 5000 new international students into the country from the middle of the year, and last week announced that Immigration New Zealand will begin processing other study visas at that time - brought forward from October.
There are currently 12 thousand foreign students in the country - compared with 86 thousand in a normal year pre-pandemic - across all parts of the education sector - and worth five billion dollars to the economy.
The university sector alone used to have around 20,000 foreign students - worth $1.2 billion dollars.
The government has warned it is does not intend to go back to a "bums on seats" model, and international students coming here will face tighter post-study work rules and tougher financial resources requirements.
All this while fewer New Zealand students enrolled in all universities in the first trimester of this year. Kathryn speaks with Chris Whelan, Executive director of Universities New Zealand.
