GEORGE TOWN, Sept 2 — International schools in Malaysia have seen their student intakes double this year, driven by the huge number of incoming long-term visitors from China, Japan and South Korea.

Several schools polled by Malay Mail reported an increase in applications from Chinese and Japanese students this year.

"This year, we have received hundreds of applications from international students from across the board,” Stonyhurst International School Penang chief commercial officer Ng Sin Yee said.

Ng, who is also director of Stonyhurst’s admission and marketing, said its student population is usually about 40 per cent Malaysian and 60 per cent foreigners.

She added that its August 2024 intake recorded more than 100 per cent increase in international students.

"The hike in applications are mostly from China while the number of students from Japan and South Korea have remained static at about 11 to 12 per cent,” she said.

Stonyhurst is relatively new in Penang, as it officially opened in 2022 and is currently in its third year of operations.

Ng said her counterparts in other local international schools have related a similar spike in interest from students from China.

Prince of Wales Island International School business and operations manager Tim Lyons seconded Ng’s view, noting the increase in its student enrolment is mostly from China, Japan and South Korea.

"We have seen a similar increase from all these three countries as well as others in Asean including Malaysia,” he said.

He added that the increase also includes boarding students from outside Malaysia.

It is not just Penang that is seeing a proliferation of foreign students in international schools.

A company that operates three international schools in Kuala Lumpur said the number of students coming in from China is especially high in two of them.

"We used to have a number of Hong Kong students too but now, we have more mainland Chinese students,” the company co-founder who preferred to remain anonymous told Malay Mail.

She said students from China and Japan make up the bulk of the student intakes in its international schools, with enrolment from South Korea largely static.

"We didn’t use to market to international students, but we started last year, and we now see students coming from over 15 other countries,” she said.

Malaysia is experiencing a boom in the number of arrivals from mainland China after Beijing reopened its borders last year, allowing its citizens to finally leave the country after years of strict movement controls during the Covid-19 pandemic era.

The number of Chinese citizens currently living in Malaysia is estimated at between 150,000 and 200,000, according to a recent news report by the Financial Times, which quoted Ngeow Chow Bing, director of the Institute of China Studies at the University of Malaya.