Disappointed students look abroad
- Source: Global Times
- [10:59 June 28 2010]
- Comments
Parents and students enquire at the University of Massachusetts booth at the Shanghai Modern Education and Study Abroad Exhibition Sunday. Photo: Cai Xianmin
By Shen Weihuang
Students should be wary of seeing foreign universities as being necessarily better than their Chinese counterparts, a government official said Sunday, as students who received disappointing scores in their College Entrance Examination began reassessing their futures this weekend.
Many parents of students who failed to get in to their top choice of Chinese institution are now thinking about sending their children to study overseas, according to Cong Haiying, deputy director from Shanghai Municipal Education Commis-sion. He said this is due to their lack of trust in second-tier and below universities in China. "It's true that some colleges in China may have education quality problems, but the same can be said of some colleges in other countries," Cong said. "Randomly selecting a foreign college doesn't help students at all."
Meanwhile, more than 2,000 parents and high school graduates attended the two-day Shanghai Modern Education and Study Abroad Exhibition's opening day Sunday at the Shanghai East Asia Exhibition Hall in Xuhui district.
Many students attending failed to get into their first-choice Chinese college.
"Honestly, I have no idea about these foreign schools, it's a bit of a gamble," Wang Zhiwei, a 48-year-old parent, told the Global Times at the exhibition. "On the other hand, my son didn't do well in the exam, and I don't want him to enter a regular Chinese college."
Agencies at the exhibition charge over 10,000 yuan ($1,473) to place students in an overseas college.
"Some colleges in Italy and France have low language and academic requirements, almost the same standard as diploma degrees in China, and they charge no tuition fees," Ni Jun, director of Shanghai Shenyuan International Education Service Company, told the Global Times Sunday.
"The exhibition has attracted a growing number of foreign universities and domestic agencies," Jiang Lei, director of Beijing Municipal Education Commission, which jointly arranged the exhibition with Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, told the Global Times Sunday. "Today, almost every agency here has signed around 30 preliminary agreements with students or parents."
As well as the agency fee, those signing up face living costs of at least 60,000 yuan ($8,835) a year, Ni said.
The number of college places available in China has been on the rise in the past decade. In 2009, more than 80 percent of the Shanghai's 73,800 high school graduates that year went on to college. However, only 10 percent got into a top institution, according to the education commission's statistics.
