The Greater Victoria Development Agency recently launched, in partnership with local post-secondary institutions, a new program called Education Victoria. Local government and education clearly agree that their interests are aligned: bringing in more international students will boost revenues for both schools and the local economy. It is estimated that international students in British Columbia bring in $30,000 per head in spending, for a total of 1.8 million dollars (and create 21,000 jobs). Victoria is also facing a labour shortage in the next ten years, so this is also seen as a means to address that problem. The benefit of this partnership is that it can ride on the coat tails of Tourism Victoria’s marketing experience.
Read more in the Times Colonist.