Monitor, it is a franchised setup for a 9 months program in China, not it other countries to my knowledge, as locals wish to make a quick prep for abroad higher education and 'cause the mainland authorities have not allowed this academic product along their own academic courses in their high schools. Therefore, private centers take care of this shortened prep program and carry it out at local unis, high school campuses or even in their own places. The program is meant to be for two years and along the local high school curriculums, although the Chinese one is quite uncompatible to be honest. In, say for example Indonesia, according to my knowledge they provide this is a two-years program at the local high schools and after the kids graduate there they make their choices, not like in China where this the only choice as kids have dropped out from the local programs and so they'd have to come back to use yet another year. Then, either seeking a post at a center or looking to enroll your kid to these courses on mainland, it is so misleading if you see a college or a high school publicly advertising this program as it usually has little to do with the entities themselves. In fact, this is all about a private mill that's subscribed to an ACT Education Solution Limited uni prep academic program (Austrialan subsidiary to the American ACT) or shall i say that's franchised by a greatly decentralized organization called ACT, the parent company of all of this mess. Fts and locals should know that this is nothing else but a private mill company run by the great ACT that claims, as i've heard, it is not for a profit organization. My bet is that this American company has set up an off shore banking and the Australian "white horse" called ACT Education Solution Limited is supposed to facilitate and above all SHARE the profits from the mandatory 5 year 20,000 US dollars payments per center and from the royalty fees per student. The Chongqing high school dropouts paid 60,000 each last year.

Now, why are we on and on about this? This is a setup SCAM OF THE CENTURY in the education worldwide. Agreeably everyone is to benefit out of this but when the chain gets broken..or when some push their luck too far, it leads to tragedies. 9 months is too short for many mainland kids and some end up under a lot of stress abroad. Then, these kids need so much help there and others abroad are affected as well. Also, my observation is that western uni standards have gone down and some of these kinda kids that squeeze through the system there end up owning a BA or even an MBA from subjects they do not know adequately at all. Such trends may have some really dangerous consequencies in future, may they not? Another tragedy is that these young people learn how to beat the system and how to lie which also may have some grave consequencies on their and all of our future lives as these kinda people out of such easygoing schools'll further lie and lie and lie till someone gets hurt..or till they, in their leadership positions one day, manage to destroy a company or companies with their poor/dishonest practices. And,above all, yet another tragedy comes with us, the foreign teachers that facilitate these kinda programs locally. We travel continents to get to these youngsters and to help them get ready for their future higher education abroad. Here we often get paid a lot less then we would for such programs in our home countries, but i believe that many of us honestly want to prepare these local kids for their future anyway. I took almost half a salary paycut coming into this program. I eagerly agreed to the ACT-GAC academic program coz it was so much more challenging then just teaching the language and coz it offered students with such high goals. I was bored with students that just liked the language and that just wanted to find a better job or immigrate. Sadly enough I have found out that many of these ACT-GAC students (or their parents) seem to want to immigrate too.

Most importantly, I have wasted almost 5 years of my life learning the ropes in the highly dishonest academic program with some really dangerous employers that for 50,000-60,000 Yuan send unqualifies and ill prepared youngsters to western countries higher educational institutions. Moreover, all my 5 years effort has yielded me a grave trouble getting my next work permit on mainland as my last employer, or her manager, that knew me only for 6 months decided to provide me with a negative letter of recommendation. In past few months, that i've spent searching for a new opportunity on mainland, I have encountered difficulties landing a new position and worries my upcoming work permit may get declined. I am talking about the disgrace one has to go through for having done his job. I am talking about one manager in a center that decides you are not to work in China. I am talking about a decade of work in a country that may not matter as 6 months decide how good or bad you have been throughout all that time in the country. What a bigotry. What a miserable system the country has set up to have the employers or their managers abuse us so much. And, what a disasterous organization in the American ACT company that has allowed locals to abuse the product and fts to such extent. Shame on the American ACT superior T[edited] A[edited] who has not followed up on my email correspondance accordingly and who most likely has never intended to do anything about the Chongqing's ACT-GAC center as, in his words, the American headquarters do not interfere in the Chinese ACT-GAC centers' affairs. This man and his accomplices in Iowa are most likely responsible for all other poor centers'and fts miseries as he/they allowed the centers to carry out the academic product in the way the subscribers wish to carry the products out. In one of his emails to me he says that he gives warnings to subscribers, although centers keep on "roling" in their own ways.

On whether this company should stop its subscribers on mainland, I'd say YES. But if it did, I am affraid other scammers would fill in the gap. There's already a stiff competition around in this field. WEB's advertising SAT prep (another american college entry exam) and there're other turkeys like educkeys or something like that. In my view, if the west does not stop accepting foreign students from these kinda places, it'll only get worse. UK is trying, Canada would like to follow and I hope other countries like the US or Australia will get on board as well.

Cheers and beers to our efforts on mainland as well as cheers and beers to all the locals that want a true prep for higher education abroad