The Total Cost Of Studying In Australia

The cost of study in Australia has taken a turn for the worse lately, unless you already had Australian dollars saved in a bank account. Because of the lowered US dollar, a tactic often used by the US Government to improve its country's performance on the international market, we see a strong Australian dollar. That is great if you already have money in Australia and you want to spend it overseas, but if you are planning to come to Australia to study right now, you will be paying quite a lot more than you used to be. This is the same for just about all currencies, as when the US dollar is weaker and makes the Australian dollar do what it does, it also influences many other currencies, and their exchange rate with the Australian dollar. You will have to think about more than just fees when you come to Australia, and this is a look at what it will cost you.


Photo: s2art

• Visa. Getting your visa is a inexpensive activity, but getting all the paperwork together for it will be a bother. Many people in Australia are calling for a more simplified visa application process in the future. Unfortunately, if you are going to study for 3 years, you will need to show you have enough funds to cover yourself for 3 years, unlike other countries, where you only need to show the first year. This is another change that many institutions are pushing for.
• Study Fees. International students, pay on average, 4 times more than Australian students. Fees are different for each course, but this is a rough guide. Australian Universities cost about $10,000 to $18,000 per year and English Courses cost around $3,000 to $13,000 a year – the price courses can vary greatly depending on content and depending on institution.
• Living Costs. Living costs vary greatly in Australia. If you are studying somewhere like Sydney you will find the cost of accommodation is much higher than other cities. If you are studying somewhere that is a little more regional you will find that it is much cheaper. You will probably need around $500 per week, which means another $26,000 per year, but again, this will vary on where and how you live. Sharing a house in inner Sydney will mean around $200 a person for the lower end, although if you were in somewhere like South East Queensland you could get a very large home with 4 bedrooms for around $400 per week. Your living arrangements will greatly influence the cost of your living. Most students share, and even so do most Australians, and this is a very good way for many young people to live and is a very good lifestyle when it is done right. For the total $500, you should be able to cover all your needs well.
• Returning home. You need to think about returning home at least once each year, and students can get cheaper deals on flights, but you are probably still looking at more than $2000 for each round-trip flight.
• Emergency Fund. You should make sure that you have insurance to cover the worst of situations and this may be a requirement of your visa.

Getting work to supplement their income is not an easy option for many students, and only the lowest-paid jobs are the one's available unless you can use your outstanding self-marketing and networking skills to find work in your area of experience. You could consider getting creative and finding other solutions to earning money. Many Australian are also having to turn to small business to survive as the number of real jobs continues to fall.

A great combination of study choices - Business and Marketing certificates

In the New Economy, both business and marketing are undergoing massive changes, both in scope and methodologies. For those looking to break into these emerging new sectors, there are some very important study options available. Business schools are now adopting a much more flexible approach to certificate level courses in these fields. That's very good news for prospective students, because these courses can provide access to tertiary level degrees and very positive employment options.



Education as a force for change in the employment market
The fact is that the old single stream careers are on the way out. Multitasking has translated into multiple roles, particularly in business, and that’s created the demand for multiple qualifications. At the tertiary level, multiple degrees have been becoming progressively more prevalent in the United States, where the employment market is now demanding these very high value qualifications for career progression.

Until recently, this situation was putting people lacking tertiary qualifications of serious disadvantage in the job market. Many people didn't have access to the high cost and high time usage tertiary degrees, mainly because they lacked entry-level qualifications. The new approach is rapidly rectifying that imbalance. From certificate level qualifications, there is a natural progression to diploma level, which is the basal entry-level to tertiary education.

These certificates and diplomas have their own intrinsic value, too. Up to middle management level, these qualifications provide useful skills and much wider job opportunities, which in turn provide more job mobility and access to career progression possibilities. This type of training has been developing for the last 30 years and is now directly impacting the mainstream job market.

The demand for multiple career qualifications is also adding a lot of flexibility to people's job options. Very highly portable career qualifications like business and marketing certificates open up a lot of doors across multiple industries. For those who would otherwise be trapped in low-level jobs without much option for improvement, this training is truly invaluable. Certificate level qualifications allow people to set up multi-stream career paths and even in some cases to conduct multiple business ventures of their own.

How to set up your multi-stream career options
Certificate level training and the related education options provided greatly increase and develop personal skill sets which are very much in demand in the employment market. This means that the choice of study options can now be quite literally tailored to career goals.

Marketing courses and business courses are perhaps the best possible example of a combination of value-adding and baseline skills. Marketing and business are symbiotic commercial activities. A person having business qualifications, applying for a business position, adds significant value to their application by having marketing qualifications. Similarly a person applying for a marketing position having business qualifications shows immediate extra value to a potential employer or contractor.

Certificate IV in business and marketing only takes about 6 to 7 months to complete. This means the trainees can have a good working portfolio of skill sets and qualifications within a year.

If you're looking to reinvent your career or create more job options for yourself, start with certificate level training. You’ll be surprised what you can achieve.