The arrival of AI in the education sector has triggered a fundamental reshaping of the system at all levels. A 2025 report by the UK’s Higher Education Policy Institute and Kortext indicated an “explosive increase” in the use of generative AI among both domestic and international students in the UK — reaching a staggering 92%. While some experts warn that AI threatens the quality of education, others argue that it holds great promise for both students and top universities.
Vahid Mohammadi, a UK-based business developer and education technologist, belongs to the latter camp. With a career spanning over 14 years across various facets of education and technology, Vahid has been deeply involved in student recruitment, academic advising, and partnerships with leading universities in his native Iran and abroad. Bringing a system-level perspective, he has worked on multiple educational projects that integrate AI, and he firmly believes in its potential to enhance access, equity, and efficiency across higher education.
In this interview, he shares insights on how AI is transforming the admissions experience, the ethical boundaries institutions must navigate, and what the future holds for the global movement of academic talent.
How has your background in business and technology shaped your perspective on global education?
My 14 years of experience as a business developer in the startup and technology sector across sectors ranging from tourism, telecommunications, e-commerce, group discount sites, migration, international education, and cloud technology have profoundly influenced my global education strategy. I have been focused on international education over the past seven years, and two years ago, I established my own UK company in the field.
My mind has always been driven by a belief in the integration of technology into all the areas I am involved with, and education is no exception. Besides entrepreneurial activities, I have taught MBA students at some of Iran’s top institutions for over three years, focusing on business technology and mentoring many students, particularly entrepreneurial ones, in the technological area.
Over the past five years of recruiting students—particularly for top universities in the UK and around the world—and through two years of direct engagement with British universities, schools, and colleges via my UK-registered business, I’ve encountered numerous challenges and opportunities within the industry. Routinely, I turned to technology to address these issues. My background in technology and startups, combined with the experience of running a fully British company specializing in academic admissions, has enabled me to develop innovative, tech-driven solutions aimed at enhancing education on a global scale.
What systemic barriers do international students face when accessing top universities?
International students are confronted with a series of systemic barriers in applying to top universities, driven by the diversity of their nationalities and the variance in the requirements of host countries. For Middle Eastern and African (widely referred to as the MENA region) students, a significant issue is the lack of reliable information about destination countries. The majority of them rely on university representatives, friends, immigration lawyers, or unregulated social media groups (e.g., WhatsApp or Telegram) for guidance. These sources often provide incorrect, biased, or partial information, and these platforms are fertile grounds for rumours and scams. The absence of monitoring by regulators in these platforms increases the risk of scam schemes, putting the students in harm’s way.
East Asian, South American, and South Asian students from Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh share the same concerns, though the reliance on social media groups may be lower. They instead look for immigration lawyers or representatives from universities, which can be incredibly expensive. Misinformation, fake or incomplete advice, and the very high monetary cost of expert services are among the common challenges in all these countries. The prevalence of scammers further complicates the process, exploiting students’ lack of access to trustworthy resources.
Another systemic issue is the absence of personalised, empathetic consultancy services that can effectively assess the suitability of a student for a course or career. Without tailored advice, students may pursue unsuitable academic or vocational pathways. Furthermore, post-arrival issues—such as loneliness, homesickness, and part-time job finding difficulties—compound these issues, often with the same potential for misinformation and exploitation.
Briefly, structural barriers for international students include unregulated information channels leading to misinformation and scams, extremely expensive professional services, and a lack of personalised, reliable consultancy. These are further reinforced by post-arrival problems like social isolation and job issues, all of which hinder equitable access to top universities. Your experience in international education and technology underlines the need for innovative, technology-driven solutions to address these structural issues and provide more open, safe pathways for students.
Where do you see AI making the most practical impact in student mobility and admissions?
AI can most realistically be effective in making a change in student mobility and admissions by streamlining processes, reducing the necessity to depend upon costly or inefficient intermediaries, and reducing risk, such as scams. In the current scenario, traditional admissions are slow-moving, often requiring students to depend on costly immigration lawyers or unsupervised social media groups, which may provide incorrect or misleading information. Such limitations can be bypassed by AI tools through the offering of rapid, accurate, and personalised responses to questions asked by students, thus avoiding delays and uncertainty introduced by human middlemen. AI chatbots or websites, for instance, can guide students through requirements for eligibility, application steps, and visa policies using reliable, up-to-date information, protecting them against fraud activities rampant in unmonitored online platforms.
Moreover, as you’ve noted, the global education sector, particularly in the UK, is grappling with declining application numbers. AI can help universities by automating and accelerating parts of the admissions process, such as initial eligibility assessments or document verification, thereby reducing administrative bottlenecks. By providing students with tailored roadmaps for their applications, based on their academic profiles, career goals, and destination country requirements, AI ensures a more efficient and transparent process. Looking ahead, integrating AI directly into university admissions systems could further minimise processing times, creating a seamless end-to-end experience from application to acceptance.
In summary, AI’s most practical impact lies in its ability to enhance the speed and reliability of student mobility and admissions. By enabling real-time, trustworthy guidance, protecting students from misinformation and fraud, and enabling universities to process applications more efficiently, AI remedies structural inefficiencies and emboldens students to navigate the intricate universe of admissions. Your vision for a world where AI becomes part of university systems is aligned with the world’s demand for faster, inclusive access to education.
How can universities leverage AI systems to attract the most talented people from around the world?
Higher education institutions can leverage the transformative potential of artificial intelligence to attract the brightest and best from across the globe by embedding advanced tools that power enhanced identification, engagement, and support throughout the entire student lifecycle, delivering a cohesive and compelling experience that sets institutions apart.
Artificial intelligence enables universities to comb through huge sets of data, including application folders, professional networks like LinkedIn, and online courses, to identify candidates whose academic background, skills, or research interest best fit their requirements, with targeted recruitment that reaches out to the most promising minds worldwide. This data-driven approach is complemented by AI’s ability to deliver highly personalised experiences, with intelligent chatbots engaging applicants in their native languages, providing tailored information about courses, scholarships, post-graduation career opportunities, and campus life, making talented students feel valued and significantly increasing their likelihood of choosing the university. By simplifying the often complex and daunting application process with automated document verification and course recommendation systems, AI encourages high-quality candidates to apply with greater ease, removing barriers that might otherwise deter top talent.
Additionally, AI can be leveraged by universities for targeted digital marketing campaigns, directing promotional materials to specific demographics or geographic locations in an effort to effectively reach outstanding candidates. On top of these competencies, AI facilitates seamless integration of external platforms, assisting students in achieving their academic goals, e.g., academic advising or admissions consultancy services, by linking such platforms with university systems for real-time data exchange, recruitment streamlining, and expanding the outreach to potential talent pools. Keeping up to date with destination nations’ latest immigration legislation is another vital activity for AI, as it can keep pace with visa stipulations, work permits, and additional legal frameworks, providing accurate and compliant guidance that will engender confidence and reduce obstacles for applicants navigating intricate systems. Most importantly, AI assists in end-to-end student support, right from the initial application stages—assisting in the creation of Statements of Purpose, CV tailoring, and application document preparation for quality submissions—to post-acceptance formalities like visa processing, flight booking, travel arrangements, and acclimatisation to the new environment.
Once enrolled, AI can provide ongoing academic support, such as assignment writing tutorials or navigating university resources, and even extend into career counselling and networking after graduation, building a lifelong support system that enhances student success and retention. By connecting universities with student-centric platforms, ensuring compliance with immigration policies, and offering this end-to-end support from application to post-graduation, AI not only attracts the world’s top talent by simplifying their experience but also positions universities as the institutions of choice, powering both recruitment and long-term retention of exceptional global talent.
How should institutions approach the integration of AI while maintaining academic integrity?
Institutions must address the integration of AI while upholding academic integrity by embracing a strategic, ethical approach that utilises AI as an assistive tool and never as a replacement for student work without compromising academic standards at any point throughout the learning process. While AI can assist learners before applying—acting as a guide by providing advice on the admissions process, visa requirements, and application preparation, akin to an immigration lawyer or university admissions officer—the focus here, as you put it, is largely on its role while one is studying. During this phase, students are tasked with assignments, research proposals, dissertations, and other academic work, which historically required extensive consultation with professors who often lacked the time for detailed feedback, leaving students confused. The advent of tools like ChatGPT introduced new challenges, as some students began using AI to complete assignments, leading to plagiarism and AI-generated content, including, in some cases, published ISI articles. Initially, without AI detectors, this kind of abuse went unchecked, and universities, educators, and students became indignant about AI. This led to the development of AI detectors that could identify AI-generated submissions on assignments, Statements of Purpose, or other submissions, and institutions rejecting those found to be AI-generated. In response, humanisers emerged to combat detectors, developing an unproductive cycle of technological competition. Teachers then rely on the combination of AI detectors, prior student knowledge, and contextual cues like tone to make judgments about authenticity, highlighting the complexity of academic integrity.
In response to this, institutions must make ethics-driven AI integration through developing and promoting AI resources intended to assist, rather than replace, student effort. Instead of AI tools that do assignments or do research for students, universities ought to be endorsing tools that offer feedback, suggest starting points, evaluate the suitability of drafts, and provide personalized feedback on how to approach tasks according to the standards of the university, the personal professor’s standards, or the student’s discipline. These AI systems would not produce completed work, holding the students responsible for their efforts while receiving specialised, individualised advice to better their performance. This includes pre-application processes as well, where AI assists students in creating CVs or Statements of Purpose without generating them themselves, maintaining the authenticity. By incorporating these moral AI resources into their institutions, organisations get to develop a culture where students utilise AI responsibly and scholars not only acquiesce to but also embrace AI as an educational collaborator. In this manner, AI supplements learning while guaranteeing scholarship integrity, establishing an open, credible setting where students grow their expertise with honesty and institutions maintain their academic standards.
What does ethical use of AI in the context of international education look like to you?
The ethical use of AI in international education is the leveraging of AI as an open, assistive, and equitable tool that empowers the learner while upholding academic integrity and equity across all stages of their learning process. Before submission, AI should have a mentorship role where it guides students through the process of application, such as writing Statements of Purpose, preparing CVs, and organising application documents, but never creating these documents on their own behalf. For instance, rather than penning an SOP, AI can offer comments, suggest starting points, or highlight areas to work on, but still keep the work authentic to the student. This encourages genuine effort and skill development without deception. Having submitted their applications, via visa processes, travel arrangements, and acclimatisation in a host country, AI can provide timely, correct, and up-to-date information according to the latest immigration regulations, protecting students from scammers and misleading facts prevalent on social media platforms with no regulation.
By providing credible guidance, AI ensures students navigate these complex processes with confidence and security. Under study, ethical application of AI is not completing homework for students, but helping them learn. Instead of completing assignments or research, AI can give direct instructions on completing tasks, leave feedback on draft papers, or demonstrate how to meet university requirements, remembering the requirements of specific professors or departments. This approach not only sidesteps plagiarism but also enhances the scholarly abilities of students so that they can become self-reliant learners. After graduation, AI can continue to help students either through career counselling or networking, but not by making choices for them, thereby maintaining their autonomy.
Above all, ethical AI will operate openly, declaring the origins of its data clearly, and be just by avoiding prejudice, e.g., unequal treatment based on nationality or economic status. By complying with destination countries’ immigration law, AI ensures that students get correct, law-compliant advice, further safeguarding their confidence. In essence, ethical AI in international education provides learners with tailored, accurate advice, protects academic integrity by encouraging original work, and produces a well-balanced, transparent setting for the advantage of universities, learners, and the overall educational system.
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About Vahid Mohammadi
Vahid Mohammadi is a UK-based EdTech entrepreneur with over 14 years of executive experience in business development across Iran’s top technology startups, cloud computing firms, and telecom companies. Since moving to the UK in April 2023, he has founded two ventures — Universitio and AskiMate — focused on simplifying access to UK education through AI-driven platforms. Vahid specializes in bridging technology and business strategy to drive scalable growth, and has mentored over 100 entrepreneurs. With a strong track record in SaaS innovation, strategic partnerships, and cloud solutions, he is now building transformative tools for global learners.
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