Unscrupulous consultants exploiting Int'l Students as cash cows

[GMTplus7]

<p>A depressing article about how international students and parents get exploited “not only by agents…but also by the independent schools that pay and enable them”
[Chinese</a> Students Lose as U.S. Schools Exploit Need - Bloomberg](<a href=“http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-19/chinese-lose-promise-for-52-000-as-u-s-schools-exploit-need.html]Chinese”>Chinese Lose Promise for $52,000 as U.S. Schools Exploit Need - Bloomberg)</p>

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Boarding schools with small endowments and less selective admissions policies are boosting their revenue and enrollment by recruiting thousands of Chinese students who pay full freight… many of these schools are using agents with misleading sales pitches to tap a growing number of wealthy families in China eager for the prestige of an American degree

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Promised an elite college-prep experience by agents in China, these students often find that one-third or more of their dormmates are also Chinese, and many of the U.S. students require extra time and support. The schools end up segregated academically and socially

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Unlike sought-after boarding schools with hefty endowments, which only admit a handful of Chinese students who speak fluent English, lesser-known schools recruit the Chinese by offering English-language instruction – and by using agents who put a flattering spin on their reputations

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<p>Buyer beware…</p>

[ops]

<p>Hmmm, would appear someone up the economic food chain has some push pull and wouldn’t surprise me it comes from China to get it written in Bloomberg. I don’t think this is common knowledge but well known within the boarding school circles. I don’t know if it is necessarily a fault of the consultants as it is the desire of main land Chinese parents to get a U.S. private education, more of a supply and demand scenario.</p>

[Momof7thgrader]

<p>The article outlined the difference between agents and consultants. We were concerned at one school that had a large contingent of Korean students and the school seemed quite segregated. This wasn’t a school focused on learning issues but it was small and therefore the issue seemed quite pronounced. I asked one of the faculty and they were quite open about the difficulties they faced in integrating the students. </p>

<p>I was more perturbed by some of the school officials and their comments.</p>

[GMTplus7]

<p>Seems that the parents are at the mercy of the intermediaries because of the language barrier. If the parents knew English, then they could access online readily available stats on these schools from websites like boardingschoolreview.com and CC.</p>

[EnemyOfTheSun]

<p>It is significantly harder (nigh impossible?) for international students to get admitted with financial aid as well, since priority goes to US-citizen applicants. Thus, if internationals are admitted, they’re usually full pay anyway. How does that make us, as stated, “cash cows”?</p>

[GMTplus7]

<p>The elite BS are not desperate for money, so they value int’l students for the diversity they bring to the campus, and they limit the number of int’l students from any particular country in spite of the fact that they could easily fill the school w full-pays from that country.</p>

<p>Schools without the godzilla-sized endowments are hungry for full-pay students, so the unscrupulous schools misrepresent themselves to unwitting int’l parents w limited English and view the int’ls like this:</p>

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“You can turn the valve on and off,” said Jay Goulart, the school’s former interim headmaster. “If you need another 20 kids at 50 grand a pop, you get them from China.”

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