Home Office UKVI Compliance Approach for Academic Year 23/24
As we sign off on the current academic year, all institutions will review their compliance status for their critical stakeholders. One such stakeholder is the Home Office. The primary objective is keeping Tier IV Highly Trusted Sponsor Status. This requires evidence of compliance with Home Office UKVI Compliance record-keeping requirements during HEAT team audits.
Every University, College and School with international students must be capable of evidencing their adherence with UKVI compliance obligations.
To recap on earlier posts, BREXIT means c. 20% annually more students (120,000) added to the Home Office UKVI Compliance Student Cohort. This number is based on HESA figures for 2021/22. The Pandemic brought the need for remote monitoring of accepted students restricted to remote study in their home countries.
Systems and processes need to be capable of adapting to the latest changes in UKVI rules and regulations nad UKVI guidelines. They help an institutions compliance team rapidly establish the metrics for a basic UKVI compliance assessment.
Fast forward to today. Post pandemic, online and blended learning are now the norm, not the exception. This makes meeting UKVI compliance obligations harder in some ways. More touchpoints and less facetime. Remote and hybrid working compounds the enormity of the task.
So, how do institutions address this new reality?
- In-person teaching, and remote teaching, will need to be treated as equals in reporting terms.
- Revised Systems and processes to account for the complex scenarios this presents for rules based UKVI compliance processes.
- A cross-functional approach to international student support and wellbeing.
It is not enough to report on the outcomes. Prompt early interventions with struggling students are the real key to unlocking a clean bill of compliance health.
This innovative approach ensures better international student success and retention numbers. This will meet the needs not only of our key stakeholders, such as UKVI, but also the needs of our students.
Students will benefit from relevant, timely targeted supports and guidance. This will ensure the best possible student experience and learning outcomes for all students.
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