‘It’s a dead end’: Int’l students appeal for a transition period before imposing age limit on graduate visa

Key Points

• An online petition has been published on Parliamentary of Australia aiming to gather 20,000 signatures before 12th of June 2024 at 11:59PM AEST, after a proposal has been made to lower the age requirement for Temporary Graduate visa 485 applicants from 50 to 35 years old.
• Australian Bureau of Statistics recorded a 5% increase on the number of Temporary Graduate visa subclass 485 lodgements since 2022. Last year, the Department of Home Affairs received 105,146 applications.
• Based on the research conducted by the Group of Eight universities and the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations in 2022, about 40% of the PhD students are aged 30 or over.
• Home Affairs recently announced that the eligibility age will remain at 50 for certain streams of the visa, specifically for “international PhD” and “masters by research” applicants.