Recruiting Intelligence

Career opportunity is the primary motivating factor for international students. All our research into the international student journey says so. We’ve known this for a long time. If you can demonstrate that your degrees pave a beaten path to positive career outcomes, then you’ve got your prospect’s ear. Not many institutions can back up their promises with data...until now. 

Institutions seem to have had a hard time making the case for bottom line ROI. Sure, there’s the usual “x% employed within 6 months” data every institution flaunts, but what does that really tell a student who’s halfway around the world? Not a whole lot. We’re not saying to nix that stat – definitely keep it – but it’s hardly concrete proof for your prospective students. 

The fact is most institutions simply don’t have the student data on the whole job search process to offer much more. Especially for international students graduating from your specific institution. 

Nor do most institutions have the bandwidth to think it through for the international cohort. But data does exist that can help you uncover a truer and fuller picture of career potential for your international students. It’s a matter of knowing where to look, how to look, how to clean and crunch the data, and then interpret that data appropriately.  

Enter Intead’s analytics team and our colleagues at F1 Hire! On offer to you for download: our first Connecting Dots study, How International Students are Finding US Jobs: A Look at the Students, Degrees, and Institutions Producing Success. 

Our next opportunities to meet!  

GMAC Annual Conference, New Orleans, June 19 – 21, 2024. Ben will be presenting on how global elections are influencing student mobility. More than just the US presidential election has the power to upend what students will choose to do next.   

EducationUSA, Washington, D.C., July 30-August 1. Ben and Viginia Commonwealth University SIO Jill Blondin will share insights on Navigating Budget Challenges in International Recruitment: Practical Strategies for Every Phase.  

Be in touch! We’ll buy the coffee. 

Our newest dataset focuses on practical next steps for international graduates. The ROI insight they’re really after. And for institutions, our approach to analyzing US Department of Labor data can help your marketing recruitment team stand out at any student fair anywhere in the world. Wanna see how? Read on to download our report... 

No one on the Intead team has participated in an Iron Man competition, but the adrenaline levels we are experiencing make me wonder if preparing three different, compelling, in-depth reports in time for NAFSA next week compares. I'm confirming that no one from our team will be running, biking, or swimming to New Orleans for NAFSA, but we have been running the analytics on some really novel data all related to different aspects of the international student journey. We’re so close to the finish line! 

The work has been exciting, sometimes difficult, and the data is beyond beaten up at this point. The payoff will be so rewarding. We really can’t wait to share all we’ve learned.

Today, we are going to let a few whiskers of one of our cats out of the bag. 

Let’s meet in New Orleans @ NAFSA 2024! 

Join one of Intead’s two NAFSA presentations: 

We’ll be presenting insights in our two valuable Nafsa sessions: 

• ChatGPT and AI: What are the real opportunities for enrollment management? 
  Wed., May 29 @ 1 p.m. in NOCC, Room 391
  Featuring Dr. David L. Di Maria, SIO & Associate Vice Provost for International Education at UMBC with Iliana Joaquin, Director, Digital Marketing at Intead  

• Groundbreaking Data: International Student Employment After Graduation
  Thurs., May 30 @ 11:30 a.m. in NOCC, Room 398-399
  Featuring Dr. Joanna Regulska, Vice Provost and Dean - Global Affairs, UC Davis and Nafsa Board Member with Ben Waxman, CEO at Intead 

Be the first to know!  Pre-register to receive Intead’s 2024 proprietary reports as soon as we publish them. 

We are all seeking to understand the global landscape for international students. Our latest research takes a hard look at the US career options and outcomes – key drivers of international student decision-making. Career outcomes are, after all, a central metric for many international students. Our take: not understanding how your institution plays into the US international employment scene puts you at a recruitment disadvantage. 

So, we partnered with our colleagues at F1 Hire to examine both public and proprietary data sets.  

If you’re not familiar with F1 Hire, its web extension, designed for international students in the US, has become the must-have tool for OPT/CPT/H-1B job seekers. Together we analyzed the US Permanent Labor Certification Program (PERM) and H-1B visa application data tracked by the US Department of Labor between 2018-2023. We will be sharing insights into the career pathway options for international students who entered the US workforce upon completing their degrees at US higher ed institutions as well as those who earned their degrees abroad. We reviewed this data against IIE Open Doors stats and proprietary data owned by F1 Hire. 

What we learned was fascinating.  

By drilling into this employment data, we see many ways institutions can use this information as a recruitment tool to demonstrate their success in helping international students find employment.  

An example: Our analysis of F1 Hire’s collection of 1.5 million job opportunities reveals significant disparities in H-1B opportunities relative to the number of international students by state. 

Here’s a sneak peek that surprised us: We found 6.4 H-1B opportunities in New Mexico per international student studying in state compared to just .34 H-1B opportunities in New York per in-state international student. Hello, New Mexico as a student destination! We simply didn't see that coming.

Our full report, which will be available soon, provides keen perspective on: 

• International student earning potential 
• Geographic insights (countries and regions) 
• Industry insights 
• India-specific insights 
• Job search insights 

And of course, we offer our take on what this all means for your international student recruitment efforts. 

Read on to register and be among the first to receive our full report. Below, we also share key takeaways from our research…