CollegeToU.com Education Blog

This last week has left many Indian students jittery with their hopes dashed of studying abroad in United Kingdom or Australia. On 31st January, came the news that UK Tier-4 Visas were suspended for Indian students and later the official Indian Government travel advisory against Australia to students looking to pursue Higher Education in that country.

UK government has cracked down on hundreds of scrupulous higher-education providers in the country that were running sub-standard institutions and duping students that were desperate to study. On the other hand Australia has witnessed large mismanaged education groups shut down in the wake of slow down in the foreign student influx leaving thousands of students stranded in the middle of the academic year.

Equally responsible for the plight of many students are many foreign education consultants in India who tend to make quick bucks as commissions while sending students to de-recognized or blacklisted colleges in UK or Australia because they pay higher percentage commissions. Its not very surprising to students and parents alike that many consultants in India choose to sell their souls for money over basic ethical code of conduct.

It is our sincere advise to students and their parents to verify the list of Approved Education Providers (Authorized Colleges/Universities) in each country even before applying. No student or parent should have to find out that their Institution was blacklisted even before they applied and their consultant willingly conceived that truth from them. BE INFORMED.

Please click through this link to see the updated list of Registered Sponsor of Education (or Authorized list of Colleges) in United Kingdom.

This content is syndicated from the personal blog of Mr. Nishidhar Reddy Borra, founder of Atlas Consultants, which is a leading overseas education consulting company in India. He also holds an executive member position in the AAERI (Association of Australian Education Representatives in India) council and founding member of FFECI (Federation of Foreign Education Consultants in India). Opinions expressed here are his own and not of any organization that he is a member of.

A nine-year-old Russian girl was allegedly raped on Tuesday evening in Goa’s Arambol beach, a popular hub for foreign and domestic tourists. According to the complaint filed by the victim’s mother, the girl was raped while playing in the waters. The mother said that as one Indian tourist struck up a conversation with her, another ventured in the waters and raped her child. None of the politicians or elders of the society have condemned this enough

On December 1, 2008, a Goan politician, John Fernandes, raped a 25-year-old Russian near Colva beach. Four (4) Australians have been killed in Mumbai terror attack in Nov 2008. In the past Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons were burnt alive in their car by Hindu extremists in Orissa and in 2004 Australian tourist Dawn Griggs was robbed, raped and murdered by two taxi drivers after arriving late at night at Delhi airport.

Many incidents like this have become quite common for us. Our politicians don’t bother to look into these nor issue any warnings to our own people. Foreigners in India are exposed to many bad experiences like cheating, begging, unhygienic conditions, lack of safety, robberies, racism etc.

But the few Australian attacks on Indians attracted more attention that any of the above, film stars, community leaders, politicians have all raised their voices on this. But again no one has raised any concerns on the rape of a 9 year old Russian girl in Goa which happened

Indians have been going to Australia from the past many years, never did we hear about incidents like this. But again today things have taken an ugly turn. For me it looks like Australian & Indian media are using these attacks for trashing each other.

The Australian attacks on Indian taxi drivers are examples of urban crime. Yes I agree that Indians are over-represented in robbery statistics and there is definitely a racist element to some attacks, but we must know the real reason for this. The behavior of a few Indian students has definitely a role to play in this all. It’s a common problem all over India and also abroad.

Indian students are allowed to drive cabs; many students especially from Punjab are into this. They are strangers to Melbourne and don’t know the routes very well, they also lack English fluency and they purely depend on the GPS system to know the routes. Some times the GPS only guides the cab thru the main routes and avoids shortcuts. These cabbies are exposed to drunk teenagers and gangs at nights, sometimes they take the long route and end up in fights / arguments with the passengers, some how even these are being reported as racist attacks.

Indian government and Australian government fail to understand these issues. The Australian government policies have too many loop holes and they are unable to come up with the correct measure to control such incidents. The attacks were stray incidents and small street brawls which have been given great importance. The Australian Immigration policy has also to be blamed in this, student visas were issued without proper checks and protocols. The result was that the quality of students that Australia absorbed from the past few years was really bad and hopeless. Its time they have a look into this and adopt a policy where good genuine Indian students wanting to study in universities and good institutes are encouraged and change their policies.

Finally there seems to some relief for all the students who were either already enrolled or were about to join the group of schools that were announced shut down as of 7th November 2009, run by Meridian International Group (Global Campus Management Pty Ltd), Australia.

Over the last few days the Australian Government was under heavy fire from all the agents in India as well as students who had enrolled into the Meridian International Group run schools for not taking any quick action and announcing any relief measures to affected students.

Finally the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations on behalf of the Australian Government is taking measures to ensure that the students interests are protected. The students are protected under two schemes:

• Tuition Assurance Scheme
• Education Services of Overseas Students (ESOS) Act

Fortunately the Meridian group of institutions are part of the Tuition Assurance Scheme managed by the Australian Council for Private Education and Training (ACPET). Under this scheme the students are not liable to pay any additional amount of tuition fee if they have already paid the institution in advance. Also under the scheme, ACPET will assist the students to find an alternative course similar to the one they were enrolled into earlier. If the Tuition Assurance Scheme is unable to place you in an alternative course, then ESOS assurance fund will be responsible for the same. But if however under any circumstances even ESOS is unable to find a course then the student is eligible for a full refund of the tuition amount paid earlier.

For more detailed steps about what a student has to do if affected, please visit the link http://collegetou.com/australia-news/relief-for-meridian-international-australia-students.

Currently students who are applying for the Australian visa had to show AUD $12,000 per year towards living expenses. But beginning January 2010, students would have to show atleast AUS $18,000 per year towards living expenses.

Australian Minister of Immigration and Citizenship, Mr. Chris Evans explained this to the media that this was needed based on the study and analysis done by the department as minimum required to live in Australia. He suggested that though the government understands that this will increase the burden on International students and parents, they can offset a portion of that by working part-time in Australia.

So if the student enters a 2 year program, he/she would likey have to show 2 x $18,000 = AUD $36,000 which is approximately Rs 15 Lakhs. This is in addition to the Tution Fee that the students pay.

According to Mr. Chris Evans, the ministry is also trying to control the number of poor students that enter the country. He states that a number of unscrupulous agents are making false promises to students and helping them create fraud documents. They would like to curb that immediately.

For more information about the fee increase, please read through http://collegetou.com/australia-news/required-funds-for-australian-student-visa-increases.

As of 7th November, 2009 few thousand students will be stranded out in the chill because their Colleges have shut down in Australia. These are colleges run by Meridian Group and the Global Campus Management Group.

Colleges that were affected are as follows:

1) Meridian International School
2) Median International Hotel Management
3) Meridian English Pty Ltd
4) Meridian College Pty Ltd
5) GCM Fashion Institute Pty Ltd
6) International Design School
7) Internation College of Creative Arts.

Meridian had a big network of agents and consultants working to recruit students for thee colleges from India. In India their marketing was run by a group called Campus Management Group. Entire agent network in India was managed by Campus Management Group. Even the offer letters to students were issued by the group in India.

Eventually the Campus Management Group was bought over by the Meridian Group and called as Global Campus Management Group. The Indian company was run by Mr. Sumit Agarwal who now claims that he knows just as much as anyone else about the closure of the Colleges. Even he was not informed about the sudden closure. Sources say that Sumit, is now out of the country in Australia to discuss with the Meridian management about the future course of action. Sources say that he seems to be in as much of a shock as anyone else.

But the agents and students in India are aiming guns at the Campus Management group in India becaue they are ultimately responsible for the India network. In this entire collapse students and agents have lost out majorly because some students have already paid fee for the upcoming intake while agents are waiting for their share of commissions for the past few quarters. Sources say that the Meridian Group owes crores of Rupees to the agents in terms of commissions. Some agents are now worried that students would seek compensation from the agents for the amount that they have already paid the College.

Sources say that AAERI, which is an Indian body representing all the Australian agents is considering various options including legal action against the Meridian Group. They are also in discussion with the Australian Legal counsel for seek further course of action. It remains to be seen how and when the students and agents can get back their compensation.

For more information about the Australian Colleges that shut down, please visit the link: http://collegetou.com/australia-news/australian-colleges-shut-down