Appy through middleman ???

[7jason7]

Thanks, Roddy !

Question: What is the advantage/disadvantage of going to China to sudy through an intermediary school (Berkeley) or company (Educasian) rather than just applying directly? Trying to apply directly appears cheaper, sometimes by a lot.

Check this out: Tsinghua by yourself for a semester -- US$2,500: http://www.tsinghua.edu.cn/docsn/wb/lxs/clcffe.htm

VERSUS

Tsinghua with "IUP" (Berkeley) -- US$13,000:

http://ieas.berkeley.edu/iup/fees.html

-- You get better treatment if you apply through the middleman?

-- Is the teaching quality, textbooks, and whole experience different if you apply directly rather than through a middleman?

-- Are students that used a middleman mixed together with the other students that applied directly?

-- Why is the information on websites to apply so bad?

Thanks for your help, everyone.

Jason

[Dax]

Are you nuts?!!

Of course they are in the same class and use the same textbooks. I cannot believe you are even considering it. If you think that not writing few emails to the school and finding your own transportation from the airport is worth $10.5K... Did you somehow think you will get a 5 times better treatment?

Sorry for being so direct, but I don't see how someone would consider it, even if you are a millionaire.

[Tsunku]

I first went to study in Kunming through SIT www.sit.edu. It is a costly program, but there are some benefits. Keep in mind SIT is not exactly a middleman, per se, but a school unto itself. We attended classes at Yunnan Normal University, but not only Chinese classes. We also had seminars given by American professors, study-travel excursions which included lots and lots of lectures from various experts, and access to some really interesting places which we couldn't see easily on our own (like the drug rehab prison in Kunming, which was scary as hell), homestays with families in Kunming, Lijiang, and the small village of Shaxi, and 16 college credit hours which could be transferred back home, no questions asked.

So, I think, if you're deciding which way to go, you need to consider which services are being provided. If you're paying an extra 10k to be picked up at the airport and then left on your own, then forget it. However, the program I attended was basically a semester of university abroad, with many advantages which made the price just about worth it (also, most students recieved scholarships from the Freeman foundation. Mine was pretty hefty, more than half of the cost). So it really depends. If you just want to study Chinese, then enrolling directly will save you a lot of money. However, some middlemen provide a lot (and some are simply rip-offs. I wouldn't do educasian, it isn't accredited for one) of extras, which you might find worth the money.

[roddy]

Of course they are in the same class and use the same textbooks.

Sure?

The IUP program and the Tsinghua Chinese Language Program are two completely different programs. They are held in different buildings, have different teaching methods, and have different textbooks.

Roddy

[Dax]

At our university in Sichuan we had a student who applied throught the middleman. It cost him many thousands of dollars, and he ended up in the same place as us. (he had to spend one less day walking around trying to register and pay, but the rest of us were explained what to do and accomplished these things in few hours) Our school run few little subsidised fieldtrips for all foreign students.

You can buy a lot in china with little money. A lot of the extras and trips, if done independedly(meaning not though an agency, and especially not one aimed at foreigners) may still add up to less than one-fifth of what you'll be charged if you book from US. Especially if you speak some Chinese.

If you are applying to a Chinese University(this is how I understood your question) than it does not make sense to overpay. If you are applying to a program done by an American University-- depends on what you are getting. My university once run a program in Asia -- 4K on top of the regular 12K tuition(to which all scholarships applied). It involved 5 professors traveling with us and teaching on location across 8 South-East asian countries for an entire semester, included all airfare(around 20 flights), food, trips, accomodation and 16 credits. And some of these places were more expensive than China-- Japan, HK, Korea, Taiwan.

We'd get a lecture on the great wall while we were standing on it; lecture on plate tectonics while we are looking at the damage caused by the Taiwan earthquake

We learned about Khmer Roughe while visiting the killing fields and former jails... we were taught the Vietnam War as we traveled for 23 days across Vietnam. We visited the site of the My Lai massacre and learned things of which our generation has never heard... This trip was like history coming back to life. Everything was made real, the choises that were made, the consequences, the people who lived though it.

This trip has changed all of us profoundly. It was worth it. It gave awareness and freedom that comes with it.

This was why me and my boyfriend decided to spend one more semester abroad and went to China on our own. But here no one could offer as good a value as a University itself.