quote:

Originally posted by rsbolo:
I have some experience here. I taught middle school for nearly a decade and saw several organizations (including this one) host "experiences" for "advanced, gifted, talented, special" kids at premium prices.

What many of my students' parents told me was all the different "conferences" were basically glorified summer camps with an exorbitant price tag. They also told me that attendance in one of the conferences "opened doors" to basically a million other "exclusive" opportunities put on by other organizations...organizations they found to be owned by the same larger parent company.

Many of the kids were later contacted by scholarship agencies (owned by the same company who hosted the other events) who made big promises of finding scholarships...for a fee.