On 10 February 2022, Australia’s Department of Education, Skills and Employment released a discussion paper on the review of the Education Services for Overseas Students (ESOS) legislative framework.
The paper includes a section on “Supporting the quality of third-party relationships” which focuses on the use of education agents by Australian educational institutions. On the issue of education agent monitoring by educational institutions, the paper noted:
In addition to their own enquiries, providers rely on advice and information from the Department, peak bodies, and other contacts to manage their agent relationships. However, as providers only have access to information on the performance outcomes of their own agents in PRISMS, there is an information gap when they are looking to partner with new agents. Greater data transparency could reduce this gap.
Even with sufficient data, not all education providers take a proactive approach to monitoring agent behaviour that would require them to terminate the relationship with the agent. While education providers are required to outline their processes for monitoring agent behaviour in their agent agreements, standards vary between providers.
The paper then poses several questions on the use of education agents to inform the consultation.
In December 2021, the Australian Skills Quality Authority said that management of education agents by educational institutions would be an area of focus in 2021-22.
How to check and monitor your education agents
Our education agent checking and monitoring solution contains hundreds of reports on education agent misconduct and performance from all over the world, dating back to 2000.
Educational institutions can use it to:
- do due diligence on education agents – check new agents before agreeing to work with them, and run regular checks on current agents.
- protect your brand – search on your institution’s name to detect cases of unauthorised agents using your institution’s name, logo or other IP without permission.