BANGKOK – Given the rapid rise of middle class in Asia and increasing aspiration of this generation to go to Ivy League or any top schools anywhere in the west, Asian parents are paying enormous amount of money to private tutoring and so-called “educational consultants” to prepare their offsprings to what seemed to be a life changing experiences.
New companies are mushrooming in this part of the world for someone to write statement of purposes for these students – or even create extravagant trips abroad in order to re-create a new profile of these students.
True, it’s not wrong for parents to want the best for their children and it is not wrong if you are wealthy enough to afford the very best service. But it is wrong and unacceptable when capitalism infiltrates education to an extent in which students pay for dishonesty service. It’s wrong that they are taught, since the very young age, that it is OK to use money to get what they want. It is completely outrages that they are nurtured by their wealthy parents that is is OK to lie.
Since I have returned home with degrees from London, New York and Hong Kong, I personally have encountered countless of incidents whereby wealthy parents and their children’s ostentatious display of wealth disgusts me.
One incident, I was offered a blank cheque to write college application for a student from a well-known conglomerate in Thailand.
“I want to get into Columbia University. My parents can pay whatever amount you ask for.”
Seriously?
Of course it was tempting but my teacher, Professor Kevin Dougherty from Teachers College, Columbia University has taught me better:
“Amp, the minute you take money from these kind of things, that is when you end your indignity and life altogether”.
Lucky me, I was warned.
In other incidents, I was offered lavish gifts to write letters of recommendation for people I do not know.
These gifts stand for everything I am against. It is capitalism in education in its worst form. It’s ugly patronage system in its most dangerous pattern.
It is no longer just who you know that will get you somewhere in this country, globalization has created a new imagined educational trajectory for children of the well to do to become a part of global elite group. Getting into good or elite school is the first step they are willing to pay, at any price.
“My mother said, we paid even more bribery for me to get into kindergarten. She’s willing to invest in this process”, said another friend about his experience in paying for these consultant services.
Topped with Asian appetite for education, a degree from prestigious schools in the West is seen as a silver bullet that can take them anywhere.
While all these are prevalent in Thailand and Asia – it is not unique to our region. The United State has long offered these services to affluent students. Surely it is unfair for western media to reject Asian students based on this situation when the worldwide elites are also engaging in this service.
Such phenomenon is happening against the background of poverty and deprivation, it is happening in countries where educational opportunities of the haves and have nots are world apart.
If these parents really care about their children’s future, perhaps the first step is to empower them to believe in themselves. Self-centered narcissism and self-esteem are not the same things. If they really love their children, they will refrain themselves from these activities. How would their children survive in the school environment where it is highly competitive and highly demanding?
If they really love their children and care for the future of the nation, this tragedy must end.