Recent crimes ar Melbourne Uni worry International students

Many students are worried about their safety after a recent spate of crimes had been committed around Melbourne Uni. We reassure them that it is safe to study in Melbourne.

Last month a spate of crimes against International students has happened at Melbourne Uni. Whilst RMIT has no crimes happening students are still worried.

These crimes happened late at night when students are studying after hours. Here students are being pickpocketed or called names. Sometimes even bullying. Students don't know where to go for help.

The Age has reported that there were recent muggings in Melbourne. There was a home invasion in Ormond just recently. It was reported in Meld that there were 69 offenders, including 56 for robberies and 13 for assaults since January 1 this year.

Our concerns for the International student community
If the crimes increase against students, particularly Asians, students will tell their friends and go elsewhere. Many students are afraid to speak up because they think that they will lose their visa, but that is not the case.


What now?
The police have ramped up the security and are working with Melbourne University to help solve the problem. But there are ways in which students can not be the target of theft and assault. One of them is not to carry so many valuable items to uni such as a laptop and expensive phone. Most smartphones these days come with WI-FI capabilities which means that students should leave their laptop at home.

Studying late at night? Uni security do have free escort service for students to the train station etc. There are protective services officers at stations looking out for people. Also do let your roommates know if you are out late at night.

Students scammed online

Many Vietnamese students in Melbourne and Sydney have been scammed by a fake travel agency. We explain in more detail and tell you how to avoid this sort of scam.

An example of a fake ticket courtesy of Vietnam news

Vietnamese students are scammed online by a fake travel agency. Here they pay about $1000-$1500VN to go home but they never receive the ticket. This is for the lunar new year celebrations. They pay the money and then they receive a code which does not work on the real airline site or at the airport.

Now these students are sad and angry that they couldn't visit their parents.

They are trying to get their money back with the police stepping in. They tried to contact the woman who sold them the ticket to get their money back. In fact some of them went to her house to only find that the address did not exist.

This is the letter from the NSW police.

Letter from the police acknowledging the scam. Image courtesy of SBS Vietnamese

Moreover the woman was arrested and is facing charges for deception. She earnt about $360,000 AUD from the students

One student complained to our office about this fraud and could not pay their tuition fees or their living expenses after that. They work as a cleaner. They wanted to go home to see their parents for New Years but could not afford the flight home as it is really expensive. So they bought from the scam agency. And now they are waiting for their money back.

Lesson learnt: Be wary of scams. Always order the ticket from the real airline site or at the travel agency face to face. There are some good travel agencies out there such as Student Flights or STA and they have many cheap and legitimate deals for students.

Latin American students worry about the cost of living in Melbourne

According to a recent report done by Refuge of Hope there are lots and lots of wild expectations about living costs. But in reality Melbourne is very expensive and jobs are hard to find here. We explain.

Melbourne Uni. Image courtesy of theconversation.com

Most of the people surveyed in the report have been living in Melbourne for less than two years.

Access to information 
The survey respondents mainly got information about living in Melbourne from their friends and family. Some got it from their university. Information about job opportunities is one that needs the most improving. Universities could do more to improve their careers service in 2016 such as offer on campus jobs.


Costs of living in Melbourne
Because of the rising costs in Melbourne many found it hard to adapt to life in Melbourne.

Food is one of the concerns. The Couch an International student hub serves about 100-150 meals per day and more for hot drinks.Veronica often comes to the Couch for regular nightly meals as it is free.

Rent is also another with many students trying to juggle that as well as public transport. For some the cost of the daily fare can take a toll on their mental health as they worry about the finances. Some students are not eligible for the iUSE pass as they are in regional areas or don't come to uni much during the week. Many of the fines come for not having a valid ticket on a tram. The fine is now $223 and it comes in six weeks time.

Also the cheaper houses are far far away from uni and are often in places of crime. Hence students will have to worry about their safety at night.

Getting a job is not easy but if your English is good enough you can freelance.

Do read the report online here

BEWARE: Private providers are still failing

This issue has been talked about for some time now and it has cropped in Meld Magazine's site as well as AFIS and CISA's newsfeeds. At the last conference there was some talk on it. Last year there was some talk on this issue. We examine it more closely as many students don't know about these loopholes.


Image courtesy of easyuni.com

There is another report online where 142 students had their visa cancelled for a dodgy provider's behaviour.

In the Ombudsman's report it was claimed that some of the providers did not apply good practice to their students. In the last year alone they investigated 488 of these providers (for poor compliance) and 142 of them had harsher penalties.

In these private colleges there are no such things as student's unions or student services. Students are left entirely on their own to study. International students need a lot of support and many of them fail courses for the first time.

Monitoring attendance was an issue for some of these colleges. International students who don't attend class a lot often fail the course.

Examples of good practice are
* meeting with the student one on one regularly throughout the semester
* telling the student when they are "at risk" at the right time, i.e when the current semester has just passed and they have failed more than 50% of their courses (subjects) in that particular semester.
* allowing students to appeal first before reporting them
* monitoring attendance properly. Students should be attending classes for 80% of the time.

Examples of bad practice are
* telling the DIBP of non compliance when all avenues have not been exhausted.
* Overcharging students

Our response
We are concerned for the wellbeing of students. Many students come to Melbourne to study and many of the colleges are chosen online in their country. They chose colleges in which they can afford and not ones that are actually good for them. Most students don't have a lot of money to study and university tuition is expensive for them.

If there was such an online for private providers this would be good. This should be a ranking system in which students can rate their colleges.

Students work in the sex industry

As part of Bupa's best blog competition for 2015

More and more students turn to the sex industry for work. Last year alone there were about 550+ brothels in Melbourne, most of which are small businesses.

An Illegal brothel. Image courtesy of news.com.au

Students are turning to brothels in order to find work which pays well. Some enjoy it because of the high amount of money that they get from working there.

According to the Age many of them go on to become managers of brothel. Most of them enjoy the work but there are some which don't.

In Victoria alone there is about 800 brothels, about 523 of them are a part of a smaller company.
According to the CAV report it said that many of them were happy to work there.

But there are a lot of diseases in the brothels, though and some students may be unprotected. Also the work is done after dark in a lonely street.

Clients pay somewhere between $100-$400. A licensed brothel usually gives most of the money to the girl but an unlicensed one keeps half the profit to themselves. A license is aroudn $90-$200 per year.

The disadvantages
Social stigma is one of them. Many workers cannot tell anyone that they work in this industry for fear of being stigmatised. Some of them felt discriminated against

Also the hours and work per week varies and they may have to move places. Some of the workers hated that.

Diseases are widespread so its easy for a worker to get an STI (sexually transmitted infection)

The advantages
Workers get to take home about $1000 a week and some don't have to speak English.
 It is also easy for those to work the 20 hours a week. 

The Sports and Recreation expo

As part of Bupa's best blog competition for 2015

This expo was on today at the Drill Hall and here lots of sporting clubs came- 20 to be exact. But only 30 students came and participated in the Bollywood and all.



Capoirera was my favourite one and I had a chance to play in the band. I had heaps of fun.

The aim of the expo was to showcase sporting clubs to many of the students who have never known them and win prizes such as free gym memberships. It was also a chance for them to get active. I know I will.

And it was also a chance for many students to interact with stalls and play their free games such as the shooting game that was played at the Malaysian stall

" English is a problem with International students" Domestic students speak out.

English has been a huge problem for International students. Moreover domestic students have to work with Internationals, meaning that there will be more work for them

The last few weeks the Four Corners report has been talked about and debated about. Now we would like to talk about the English language problem for International students and how it affects domestic students.

Each semester students have groupwork to complete and most International students have to work with Domestic students in Australia. English can be a problem for Domestic students who have to do a lot of the work such as editing the assignment and reworking the bad English. Trouble too is that they would have a hard time understanding the International students. International students too would have a hard time just understanding the instructions.

In the first year there was a case where someone plagiarised the assignment in one of my groups. Luckily though it was only a draft and nothing more. But then after I found out there were some tensions within the group.

There are English language courses for those that don't meet the English language requirements and from there they go onto to do the mainstream programs. But we highly doubt as to how much information students are taking in during their lectures and tutorials and how much they can contribute to the group. More often than not students talk during the lecture making it hard to hear the lecturer.

What do you think? 

Pride Mentoring program

RMIT has a program for queer students on campus and we talk about how good this is in terms of looking for a job

The Pride Mentoring program is for RMIT Queer Students only. But each university would have a similiar program. It has been operating for two years now and has been going well.

The other unis don't have this as there may not have been any funding for these services

It is a career focused thing. They can read over resumes.

Equity- not all workplaces are equal and not everyone is accepting. They can advise students but they are not legal experts.

It is easy to sign up and they match you to a mentor. And then you connect and then you initiate the first meeting. It goes for 24 weeks with one hour meetings every week. Your mentor will be there every single step of the way but they don't look for the job for you. You have to do that, but can suggest events for you.

The mentors are very friendly and they have been in the same shoes as you.

Do apply for it via their site.

International Overseas Ombudsman

International students do you have a problem with your studies and can't get a hold of your uni? Or are you unhappy with your uni's response? Well the International student Ombudsman is here to help.

The International Student Ombudsman is there for all students. They appear at many International student orientations all year round.

Like the Victorian Ombudsman the International one also overseas complaints from students about providers. They are funded by the State Goverment to look after all International students.

They are available during office hours to assist students and they are a free service for all students.

They are based in Carlton and have been established since 2009.  They are a friendly team who are willing to work with you whatever the problem is. They can work with you at home or in the office.

Last year they dealt with many International students problems mainly in private colleges.

But they have a guide to your rights as an International student and you can read about that here.

Universities and others hit back on plagiarism and the ghost writing service

Universities in Australia now have harsher penalties for the students who use ghost writing services. It is only a small amount of them. We also have harsh $800 penalties for those who post their services on Facebook and other social networking sites as part of the crackdown on plagiarism.We explain.

A few months after the Mymaster scandal and universities are hitting back on this ghost writing thing. First up was University of Sydney. The University of Sydney now has stricter policies dealing with this.

When RNIS saw all the ads on Facebook they decided on an ultimatium: "Remove the ad or face $800 penalty for the ad and everytime you place the ad on Facebook". They also have been removing many of these ads on campus.

RNIS did a search bing.com and found a lot of ads. They found about 33,600,000 results online.

Our test question was this: Are iPads effective for the classroom? We also pretended that we had an assignment due a few days after and pretended to be the panicking student.

We tried out one site called assignmentwriting.com. It looks legitimate to one disconcerning eye who does not know that it is illegal to get someone to write your assignment for you. They had been going for eight years.It is about $312.00 for one website to write a 6,000 word research paper.

On Assignment helps it is about $720 to write a 10,000 word report. On another site called Aussie Quality it was the same price and they had been going for 11 years.

The message to students is don't waste your money using these services. Instead if you are having problems do talk to your lecturer or utilise university services. They are free for all students. Universities are known to have stricter penalties for this sort of behaviour.

AFIS Info Day Sem 1 2015

RNIS was invited to participate in Info day and here is what they thought

AFIS Info day was a great success during the games and the food, but not many people turned up to the seminars which was the important part of the day.

This time it was held at Storey Hall, a place which is unfamiliar to some people. But luckily there were some AFIS volunteers lurking about, looking for lost students.

The seminars covered everything to do with work rights, fire safety, personal safety and all other aspects of student life. One of the major aspect was volunteering and writing blogs to get your foot in the door. If you volunteer for something or write a blog this is a good way for people to get to know you. It is also a good way for you to learn about the working culture in Melbourne. Danny said, "when you go out there to work, no one is going to tell you whether you are doing the right or wrong thing. Only university will guide you through that pathway". I thought about that advice long and hard and it is very true. That is how some students got sacked.

Danny also talked about utilizing university services and that to an extent is true. Only university services can guide you in the right direction but it is up to you to take the initiative.

One of the things that graduates and students need to work is good communication skills. You can improve your English through volunteering and blogging and meeting up with Australian people. That is where networking comes into play. Anna from Navitas really focused a lot on networking through her speech. The guys at Globall touched on this too where students can register for a free game to learn about Australian culture. When you blog and get invited to things, don't say no and do turn up as you'll have a chance to meet other like minded individuals and learn something about food and all.

Study Melbourne wants students to have a good time, hence their meetups and you can follow them on Facebook. They also have a blog too where students can write for them. Same as Meld who were also present. Or you can write your own and its easy to start. Just think about what you like and just write about your passions. Oh and do set some time for it each week. Trust us it will help you in third year where you will have to present a portfolio of work for your final course.

Poor students doing it tough in Melbourne.

Melbourne is one of the most expensive study destinations in the world and some students can barely survive in Melbourne with the exorbitant uni and living fees.

It is reported that up to 50 International students are accessing the Couch's free service every day on a weekly basis. The students are mainly from Malaysia and South America where it is poorest countries. Most students don't want to seek this sort of help.

A lot of jobs underpay students at least $8-$10 per hour and many students are fare evading on public transport due to the high cost of living. Rent is an increasing cost which has to be met or otherwise students will be on the street begging. Already we have seen many beggars and buskers some of which are students try to make ends meet. The buskers don't earn heaps of money and they could be making up to $10-$50 in one sitting

More over food is getting a bit more expensive along with rent. The city's free tram zone doesn't help out much as many students live in suburbs. But the price of the zone 1 and 2 is good though. The discounted scheme doesn't help a lot becuase many students don't travel a lot to uni

A lot of apartments near uni are quite expensive to rent hence many students live in the suburbs and have to travel quite far to uni which is mainly in the city.

Students which do you prefer: living in the city or in the suburbs where you have to pay more to commute?

Local students: what are some of your tips for students doing it tough?

Australia is racist towards us- stories by women

In recent months in 2014, the Australian Government has wrongly blamed the Islamic community which has lead to increased incidences of racism, some which involve International students in Melbourne. We provide three stories from International students.

Lady no 1
No one will sit next to me on the tram because I am wearing a hijab

I am a Muslim woman who lives out west nearby a tramline. I go on the tram everyday to uni. Because I am wearing the hijab, not one local would sit next to me on the tram. In fact they all run away or prefer to stand. They are scared that I will bite. Truth is, I don't bite.

I get attacked late at night

Lady no 2
I am a Postgraduate student who studies late at night. Like the first story I also wear the hijab (head covering). I live in Dandenong (Dandenong is about a 30-40 minute train ride) and the Pakenham/Cranbourne line is full of junkies at night. My house is about ten minutes walk away from the station and I don't have a car (or anyone to pick me up late at night).

So one night I was walking home from the station and a group of thugs punched me. Another time someone shouted abuse at me. Another time I was robbed.

I am scared as I am telling you this but I can't afford to live anywhere else.

I was called names

Lady no 3
I am from Middle East and I live in St Albans next to a white Australian neighbor who keeps on calling me names.

I was called a pig once. And then I was called a slut. And then my niehgbour shouted: "Go back to where you came from". I reported it to the police but they were no help.

Don't get me wrong Melbourne is a nice place to study. But some people are racist towards us.

Perhaps there might be a resolution?
In the new year the RNIS bloggers hope that the Government will intervene to stop this racism and harsher penalties for such things. If the racism stops then Melbourne might be a bit more attractive for International students. Melbourne might be in the first place.

Meanwhile the RNIS bloggers are welcoming of everyone no matter where they come from. We call for harmony and tolerance towards everybody. And we are concerned about the Governments action to combat domestic terrorism

Students entering Australia on false documents and financials

In a report by the Australian and published this year, many students are entering Australia on false documents, such as false English language tests and other documents. Universities hate this. We talk about this controversial issue.

Students from India and Nepal are doing such a thing. There has been a lot of problems in the past year with many documents and visas being cancelled by Immigration. In the last year alone more than 7000 visas had been cancelled due to the fraud. In 2012 about 1978 visas have been cancelled and in 2014 about 4093 visas were cancelled. Navitas (a private college) cancelled 40 agent partnerships when they found out they were sending non genuine students

Some of the students ghost hop from one course to another which is cheaper and maybe from an unregulated place. The practice is illegal. These students come to Australia on a streamlined visa, only to find a cheaper course or to work. Last year alone about 1000 students did do this illegal thing.RNIS met CISA some time ago and they share the same concerns. In fact this is in "The Australian". Meld also had similar concerns.

One thing which is partially to blame is the unregistered migration agents who knowingly prepare documents for non genuine students. Also universities should lift their game and their English language score requirements.

Another thing which might be partly to blame is the unregulated course attendance which all students have. Universities should be doing more to monitor course attendance.

Australia earns about $15 bil per year from International students from both tuition and living costs, according to a report by the Group of Eight. Living costs are already quite high and as such there is a huge lot of poor students. Many of them come to the Couch for a free feed each day. Education is Australia's fourth biggest revenue thing to date.

International students being exploited in the workplace.

International students are working for about $8-$10 per hour which is way under the minimum wage. Yet on the other hand education agents and universities are painting an all too rosy picture of life in Australia. We talk about our thoughts on this issue.

Agents from various universities go to the prospective student's home countries trying to sell  their degrees and advertising for students to come to Australia. But what they tell students is only half the story. The other half of the story is the negativities such as being paid unfairly and the high living costs.

Many students work in fast food places and well known restaurants some of which pays terribly. One restaurant we know of in Melbourne is Dragon Boat on Lonsdale st. It has good yum cha at times but a friend told us that she gets paid $8 hour for the work she does which is pushing heavy yum cha carts and waitressing. She told me that they also do "trial shifts" which is illegal here in Australia. She also said that they ask her to work very long hours sometimes from 10am-12am.

In Sydney Fairfax Media reported that a lot of Sydney businesses including PappaRich on Broadway have been underpaying students for as little as $8-$13. In the last year alone the Fair Work Ombudsman has recovered $1.1 million in wages and businesses have been ordered to pay it back. This is a great start. And what else? The Fair Work Ombudsman has set up a taskforce just for overseas workers. But there could be more such as telling students of their rights in the first instance and that they can complain to the Ombudsman and need not fear about deported to their home country. Which many of them do if they complain to the employer. The only people that can do that is Immigration.

We hope that this year all the businesses in Melbourne and all over Australia pay their workers the right amount. Or otherwise Australia will lose students to other places such as the US. International students is just one of Australia's biggest revenues with about $15 billion dollars being earnt annually. There might be more businesses in Melbourne and if we come across some more we'd be happy to take it up to the Ombudsman and shame them on here.

Tony Abbott is about to tax our fruits and veggies

As part of Bupa's best blog competition for 2015

This week there has been news about our fruits and veggies and a new proposal to tax them. Students and locals in Melbourne are not happy with this current government. We explain.

The Abbott government (Liberal party in Australia) is about to impose more tax. Which will mean that it will be more expensive for students live in Australia. And under the new changes it will be much harder to be healthy.

The government wants to include the GST (Goods and Services tax) to fresh fruits and vegetables. The ABC calls it an unnecessary evil. But the Government thinks that can earn about $14 billion revenue from the proposed extra tax. Big companies might not pay a lot of tax.

The Government is producing a white paper and it may go through the senate.

There is a petition going and about 600+ people have signed it. The idea is branded "appaulling" by everyone and "unaffordable".

Our thoughts
Many students come to Melbourne to study and hence cannot afford to keep up with their living costs. Many of them pay exorbitant prices for studying and rent. Many International students are often paid cash in hand and some work in the grocery and fresh food sectors.

Most students are living well and truly below the poverty line.

If the Abbott Government was to tax the fresh food, many students will find that being healthy is unaffordable and will eat junk. If they eat junk for a long time then they will be obese and may not function properly in Uni. Many students will not want to come to Australia anymore and will look elsewhere.

Many International students may also lose their jobs in the grocery sector or may be forced to work casually as many people cannot afford the food.

Do sign the petition if you can and if you want to eat healthy for less

Update: The Australian government decided to withdraw the tax for now.

Victoria now has discounted passes

International students can now buy half price tickets this year. We explain this important announcement

Last year the state government introduced the new scheme. It is a three year trial which is about to commence this year. It was only years after many campaigns from the local councils and student unions.

 Now International students from participating unis and major unis can buy the discounted yearly zone 1 and 2 for $750 (half price). A normal full year is about $1500+. The unis have subsardised some of the cost and it is only available to full time undergraduate students.

The Uni's participating are 

Australian Catholic University

Central Queensland University

Deakin University

Education Access Australia

La Trobe University

Lonsdale Institute of Technology

Melbourne University

Monash University

Photography Studies College

RMIT University

Royal Gurkhas Institute of Technology

South Pacific Institute Pty Ltd

St Stephen Institute of Education Pty Ltd

Swinburne University

The Imperial College of Australia

University Institute of Technology Pty Ltd

University of Divinity

Victoria University

How to buy it

First of all you need to apply to the uni for your code and once you get it you can use it.
Simply sign up to the Iuse site and use the Uni's discount code. Each university will give you one on enrolment. Then simply buy your pass online using your credit/debit card.

For more information head to the PTV website

Is Australia racist in general

In the last few months we have seen a lot of racism and a lot of the times it just takes just one taunt or push or shove and then that student is traumatised and is not able to focus on their studies. They are usually scared for their lives.

Racism felt by students
A lot of Muslims and some Asian students felt that Australia is not a safe place after one or two taunts. But in actual fact it is.

Muslim women have to wear the hijab and many of the locals don't want to sit near them on the tram, train or bus for fear of attack and terrorism. In fact some of the locals think of them as terrorist.

Name calling and attacks
Earlier this year a Japanese student was attacked in Perth. It left them traumatised. Students in Melbourne have been called names and other things.

Speaking up
In Asian cultures we learn not to speak up and to obey our masters. But in Australia speaking up is encouraged. In university this is encouraged.

But to some extent what can governments and universities do to support students?
International students are paying around $16000-$32000 per year on tuition and even more for student services, whilst domestic students have HECS and pay 10X less that amount. Government and universities should charge the same fee. Universities should try and use this money to improve their student services and their presence on campus. Meanwhile unis should also have a better international student support service in place for International students and employ more staff for counselling services.

What do you think? Is Australia racist?

Students caught in the latest cheating scandal

 Students are being caught in the latest plagiarism and illegal scandal which is not new to the universities but is new to International students and its the biggest one to date. You may remember the ghost writer article, but this is a lot bigger than that with the company employing 100 writers to write for them. We show you this video from SBS's the The Feed as well as explain the issue.

As reported by the Sydney Morning Herald, about 1000 International students have used the MyMaster website, a site which is run by Yingying Dou from Sydney. These students are from China and are studying in Sydney but there have been a few that study in Melbourne as well that are using this site.

The site ever since being investigated by Fairfax media has been taken down. The website seems to have made $160,000 in the year 2014 alone. Yingying Dou also runs another company called "Yingcredible" which is a tutoring service.

Students pay $13- $1500 depending on the article and grade they want.

In the graphic the University of Newcastle seems to be the most popular one with a lot of requests. Similarly, there have also been requests from RMIT University students which were both surprising and alarming. RMIT has several warnings in place and this year their student services seem to be better.

International students pay a lot of money to study and their families expect a lot from them. There is a lot of pressure for students to do well in class. The university of Newcastle has the highest number of cases using the site.


There could be criminal charges for buying essays online as well as expulsion and exclusion from the uni. RMIT and other unis take cheating very seriously which means that there will be disciplinary hearings in uni.

When the other students and lecturers found out about the cheating they were very outraged. They said that if the students got a "good job then they would be found out very quickly". Also the others say its not far. The academics blame the uni for the problem of letting in students who have poor English.

Question in hindsight is: Why don't RMIT students use RMIT's free student services to help them pass their assignments when they are being promoted throughout the uni?

Arrow on Swanston's housewarming

RNIS was invited by Meld and Arrow to attend

We gave Arrow a housewarming hamper full of love and goodness and we had made it ourselves/

For the hamper:
We bought tabasco chocolate from Thomax Dux for $5. We also bought a lolly jar ($1.50)from the Reject shop and we filled it with pink boiled lollies ($3.95) and chocolate coated coffee beans ($3.95) from the Original lolly store. From the lolly store we also bought the dessert gum ( I think it was $4?)

The box itself is recycled. It was only used once and it was bought from Daiso.

We made the braid ourselves using leftover embroidery thread. The bow was made out of leftover (but new) ribbon.

The lollies we bought for the hamper

The pink spatula was bought from the Reject shop for $1 and it has a recipe attached to it.

The notepad is from the Prahran Market and is from one of our sample bags.

As for the party itself it was low key and heaps of fun. Many friends were made throughout the activities that we did as teams. There was also bonding over the food bought at Costco.

We played charades and arm wrestle where teams won prizes from Hoyts and the Escape room. Teams also had fun with the balloons

 Many thanks to Arrow for having me and do check out their apartments. Their apartments are affordable for all and there is heaps of social activities such as these for students to get involved.

The deets:
Arrow on Swanston
488 Swanston st
Melbourne 3000