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Ministry urges student caution

The education ministry yesterday reminded students and parents to "stop, look, and listen" before making the decision to study abroad and to be careful when signing contracts if registering for study abroad programs through agencies.

Officials said that summer was the time that most students undertake short-term study abroad programs, but every year problems arose from disputes between students and agencies.

Approximately 32,000 students apply for study abroad visas per year with numbers for those who are only applying for short-term or travel-study programs totalling about 6,000 per year, according to education ministry figures.

Officials said that 10 to 15 agency-student disputes are reported to the ministry per year usually over money-back policies and procedures.

Chang Chin-sheng (張欽盛), director of the Bureau of International Cultural and Educational Relations under the Ministry of Education, said that the ministry has revised study abroad guidelines for contracts written by study abroad agencies.

Such agencies help students apply to foreign schools or language programs and charge a handling fee. A contract is signed between the agency and student.

Wu Ya-chun (吳亞君), an education ministry researcher on the project, said that previously, guidelines did not require that contracts explicitly state how much percentage of the handling fee was to be returned in the event of cancellation of a trip, but this has now been clarified.

Depending on how much of a student's application has been processed by the agency, if the student decides to cancel plans to study abroad, he or she can ask for at most 75 percent of the handling fee back, Wu said.

Wu added that problems often stemmed from the fact that many agencies were not registered or that the contracts they provide students with are vague.

The International Education Consultants Association, an organization composed of over 100 members who have dealt with study abroad or travel-study programs for many years, was present at the conference and called for agencies to act responsibly.

Sharon Hung (洪世英), vice chairman of the association, said that students should first find out as much as possible about the overseas programs they are interested in and then budget accordingly.

Then they should make sure the agency they choose to help with applications is a legally registered one, Hung said.

If registering on their own and not through an agency, the students should make sure that they are in fact applying through the school's official Web site and not a third-party organization's, she added.

Chang said that details of travel-study program regulations such as insurance problems were still under discussion at the ministry.

However, the ministry hopes that the contract guidelines can help prevent further disputes between agencies and students, he said.
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