Edlocate counselling staff assisted representatives from the following universities who participated at the recently concluded Australian Education Exhibition in counselling prospective students.

• Australian National University(ANU) in Canberra.
• Swinburne University of Melbourne
• University of Newcastle in NSW
• University of Wollongong of NSW
• Carnegie Mellon University of SA

This Exhibition titled "Australian Education Excellence Showcase 2011" was held in Colombo on March 1 and 2 at the Cinnamon Lakeside. There were a large number of students and parents on both days. They had many questions from the representatives with regard to university standings, international acceptance of courses, and the advantages of studying in Australia as against other popular countries that provide tertiary education to international students. They also questioned about visa procedures and the reasons for tightening of migration rules that affect international students too. The university representatives answered these questions assisted by their local counterparts. Those who required more detailed clarifications were invited to special counselling sessions that were organized by Edlocate in their Colombo office following the exhibition where a session was held by the Australian National University.

Edlocate counselling staff also took this opportunity to have one to one meetings with the visiting representatives at the Edlocate Colombo office.

At these meetings Edlocate staff briefed the visiting representatives on the appointment by the visa division at the Australian High Commission in Colombo of a few selected university representatives including Edlocate as Streamlined Agents. The Streamlined Agents who have signed an official agreement to abide by the regulations pertaining to issuing of student visa are authorized to do the Pre Visa Assessments (PVA) for students on behalf of the visa division and authorize enrolment in institutions. These agents are thus only handling genuine students and making the process of obtaining visa for such students hassle free.

It was the first time that such an exhibition was held as an Australian Government initiative. It was also the first time that officially appointed university representatives were permitted to participate collectively to assist the universities, in their efforts to promote genuine students to Australia for tertiary studies.
The previously held Australian Educational exhibitions were more or less organized in a private capacity and participation by officially appointed university representatives was denied. Austrade having understood the important role played by officially appointed University Representatives corrected this situation.

This exhibition, the first of an annual feature was well organized and the credit should go to Austrade Sri Lanka office for the initiative and hard work. Edlocate who officially represent 15 Australian universities and a host of pathway institutions will take an active role to get more of their principals to participate in the exhibition in the future years. It has proven to be a good event for students from Sri Lanka to get first hand information with regard to higher education in Australia which could then be followed by the local representatives.