Europe is so small and interconnected that they have always had a lingua franca, which has been American English since after WWII. You will find numerous universities in Europe that teach in English, since the schools there have larger percentages of foreign students, and even foreign professors. This is also what enables so many U.S. students to have semesters abroad in undergraduate.
What is their ultimate goal? If they want to live abroad, school abroad makes sense. But since school choice often impacts job opportunities, they have to consider whether school abroad would make it harder to make connections to land a job in the U.S.