'Parachute kids' in for hard landing in too many cases

"Parachute kids" — the nickname given to Chinese children who are sent to the US for study at probably too young an age — have been making a lot of not so good headlines recently.

Some observers blame the bad news on the kids' psychological immaturity, their ignorance of local laws and codes of conduct or their ingrained waywardness and disrespect for parents and teachers.

Whatever the root cause, members of this group have been behind too many tragedies.

As sending young children to the US for school becomes more and more fashionable in China, wealthy parents should think carefully about one question before they rush to follow the fad: Is your child really ready to live in a foreign country and assimilate to a completely unfamiliar culture without proper supervision and hands-on guidance?

On Feb 17, three 19-year-old students from China who had been studying in a private school in southern California were sentenced to multiple years in prison after being convicted of kidnapping and assaulting two classmates last March.

Yunyao "Helen" Zhai was sentenced to 13 years; Yuhan "Coco" Yang got 10 years; and Xinlei "John" Zhang got six years.

Zhai, the ringleader in the case, apologized for her actions in a letter of repentance read to the court. "I hope they (the victims) do not carry the wounds from what I did for the rest of their lives," she wrote.

The three were charged with assaulting an 18-year-old classmate by kidnapping her and taking her to a park where she was stripped, beaten, punched, kicked, spat on, burned with cigarettes and forced to eat her own hair during a five-hour assault.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Thomas C. Falls said at an earlier hearing in the case that it reminded him of Lord of the Flies, William Golding's 1954 novel about boys stranded on a deserted island without adult supervision who become bloodthirsty and savage enough to kill each other.

"This is a wakeup call for the 'parachute kid syndrome,'" said Yuhan Yang, in a statement read to the court by her attorney. "Parents in China are well-meaning and send their kids thousands of miles away with no supervision and too much freedom. That is a formula for disaster."

The case has attracted widespread attention back in China, heightening concerns among parents with children studying abroad.

According to the Institute of International Education, more than 23,000 teens from China are currently enrolled in middle and high schools across the US, most hopeful of bettering their chances of getting into an American college. The majority of these "parachute" teens are alone, their parents remaining back in China.

In her statement, Zhai said living so far from her parents affected her in many ways. "They sent me to the US for a better life and a fuller education," she said. "Along with that came a lot of freedom, in fact too much freedom. Here, I became lonely and lost. I didn't tell my parents because I didn't want them to worry about me."

"I'm sure they suffer loneliness," Rayford Fountain, Yang's attorney, said of parachute kids. "So they bond with other kids in the small Chinese circles with no supervision, no one to turn to for assistance. So these things can get out of control."

Xinlei "John" Zhang's father said he deeply regretted sending his son to the US at such an early age. "This was a wrong decision we made several years ago and now it's a tragedy for the whole family," he said, adding that he had spent $400,000 on legal fees and travel back and forth for hearings.

"Chinese parents who want to send their young children abroad should learn a lesson from our case," he said.

Contact the writer at junechang@chinadailyusa.com.