Let’s say you’re an institution interested in moving into new international markets. India’s been done to death, coastal China’s saturated and the Europeans aren’t interested in coming to North America. So what do you do? You look for new markets – preferably ones with weak post-secondary systems, rising family incomes, and yet to be seriously exploited by foreign recruiters.

Here’s the three we’d pick right now:

1) Indonesia. Two hundred million people, an Asian tiger, and yet arguably one of the weakest higher education systems in the entire world. Universitas Indonesia isn’t bad as south-east Asian flagship universities go, but with the country only spending 0.3% of GDP on higher education, most of the HE system is a wild west of poorly-regulated private institutions. It’s a potential bonanza.

2) Russian Federation. The Putin comeback seems to be cycling to a close. Almost a third of Russians between 25 and 39 now say they’d like to emigrate – and higher education abroad can certainly help. Russia has pickings intellectually: there is an enormous amount of talent in math, science and computer science. For the moment, Russians prefer to head to Europe, but as that continent’s prospects darken, they might give Canada a look – if anyone in Canada were to bother with the Russian market, that is.

3) Italy. Italy might not fit the traditional definition of a new market for higher education, but make no mistake – young Italians want out of their gerontocratic society. Unlike students from developing countries, their secondary education tends to be similar to our own, meaning they have fewer adjustment issues and higher success rates. In the south at least, there will be many with family ties in Canada, a factor which has been of immense importance to Canadian institutions in bringing Indian students to our shores. And – not to be sneezed at – a far greater proportion of Italians are able to afford our fees. There’s literally a world of opportunity in higher education – at least for these who want to strike out on their own a bit.