Improving Higher Education Quality, Competitiveness, and Sustainability: Strategic Analysis of International Student Recruitment in Saudi Universities

This research endeavored to create and deliver a context-specific strategic framework for international students to Saudi Arabian universities with a view to enhance quality, competitiveness, and sustainability. The mixed-methods approach was used, synthesising content analysis of national policy materials and Vision 2030 texts with international best practice comparative review, surveys with administrators (n=21), faculty (n=43), international students (n=237), along with thematic interviews, with results triangulated through SWOT lens. It was revealed that administrators and faculty demonstrated heightened awareness of policies (71.43%) with preferred perceptions on transparency of admission procedures (61.9%) and sufficiency of residential facilities (71.43%). However, limitations emerged in terms of scarce devoted resources (38.5%) and underperforming international marketing initiatives (33.43%). The prevalent language barrier impacted interaction for administrators and faculty (61.91%) as well as students (75.53%). In spite of these limitations, students offered robust desire to study in Saudi Arabia (92.84%), while concomitantly forecasting administrative barriers (57.39%) as well as challenge in academic as well as social integration (67.09%). The analysis reflected that programme-target national level aims overshooting programme-level implementation with success dependent on streamlined governance structures along with English-medium instruction with suitable support with languages with merged students' servicing with partnership with industrial associates. The study yields a practical non-inferential framework through combining pre-sessional English lessons with streamlined admission procedures with centralised student advisory with performance-driven benchmark with Vision 2030 synthesised to translate national strategic intent as concrete as well as sustainably internationalisation deliverables.