INTRODUCTION: THE CONSUMER AS SUPPLICANT

‘Do but despise understanding and science, which are the highest of all human gifts, and you have surrendered yourself to the devil and must surely perish.’

So says Goethe in Mephistopheles. And, as websites of universities around the world tell us, those who desire ‘understanding and science’ must enrol at a university.

Those same university websites also describe their institutions as the path to individual enrichment and prosperity. That message might be more potent. After all it is Accounting and not Aristotle that puts bread on the table. But universities are very large and only intermittently friendly. It is not very easy to access scientific knowledge and professional careers in a foreign university in a strange country.

International students have three sets of relations with the university: with administrative processes, with academic staff and with student services. As the evidence below will show the harder moments are mostly with administration. Relations with services are more positive than negative. Academic experiences are mixed, but fraught because much is at stake. Often internal university dealings are mediated by an international student office, especially in the crucial early weeks.