Okay, now for some real dirt on m2mike. You might be wondering why I am so in to hacking schools. I don't want to preach my philosophy to you, but I think this document will give you an idea on what I think of the education system, as it exists today in the United States of America. So why do I want to hack a school computer? After reading this, you will know more about why I run this site. This story starts in 1993.
In my eighth grade year at a middle school somewhere in the United States of America, I began to slack off and get shitty about doing my homework and work in general. This led to many F's in the report card throughout that school year. As a result, my father decided to enroll me into a Sylvan Learning Center. It was in the summer of 1993 when I started attending this tutoring place. I have since left and you will find out why.
Let me explain how this particular Sylvan Learning Center operated with me. Before you can start recieving tutoring for a particular subject, you have to take some exams that establish where you are in the cirruculum (a cirruculum established by public schools, i.e. the government). Once you have been established at a certain level within the cirruculum, you are then tutored from there and upward until you reach the grade level you are currently at within school. You are then tutored to exhaustion and when you have run out of money or patience, then you can stop. That was my experience anyway. Here are the details.
It is July, 1993. I show up for my first day of tutoring and I have to take the exams that will establish where I am in the school system. This is what the entire first day consisted of. Throughout that particular day, before I had to show up at this place, I had been swimming all day. So when I show up to take exams, I had a little irritation in the eyes and I was still wearing my swimming trunks. So looking quite the Californian, I enter this building with my mother with me and we take a seat in the waiting room. I, of course, read a copy of Highlights while I am waiting. They finally call me in and they tell me how to take the test. It is a multiple choice exam and it is the first of three exams. They hand me a pencil and the first test. Then they stick me in a small room with cubicles in it. They tell me I have only so much time to finish the test (something like 40 or 45 minutes). The test administrator person walks out of the room and shuts the door. This test administrator person is supposed to come stop the test-taking when the time is up.
So I begin taking the test and for the first 15 minutes, no problem. Then I notice that my eyes are starting to water. At first, I think nothing of it. It's probably just chlorine from the swimming pool. Then not too long after my eyes have started watering, my nose begins running. After about 20 more minutes, my eyes are full of tears as if I had been tear gased. And my nose started running like a faucet. At this point, I have to slow down in the test-taking process because I am too busy wiping liquids from my face. My time ends and I have done horribly on the test because for most of the time I have been wiping snot and tears from my face onto my shirt.
I spent a total of 3 hours taking 3 tests and for most of the time I was suffering. For the first half hour of the test-taking on the first test, I could stand it. When the 3 hours had ended, I was miserable to say the least. An hour after I had left the Center on that first day, I was feeling perfectly fine and ready to go swimming again.
I started my tutoring one grade level below than where I was in public school. From then I continued recieving tutoring until the middle of September 1993 when I insisted to my parents that they withdraw me. So I withdrew. I have never gone back and I never will.
The theory is this. Could Sylvan Learning Center have rigged the test? By that, I mean did Sylvan Learning Center put some sort of chemical agent in the room with me that made my eyes water and my nose drip?
Why would Sylvan Learning Center want to do this to a paying customer? The answer is simple. The result a student gives on a test means that they have more to be taught via tutoring (if they do badly). This, in turn, means that the student will recieve more tutoring to learn the things they need to learn. This, as a result, means that you will end up paying more the longer you attend. In case you haven't figured it out by now, this means that Sylvan Learning Center is making money out of you. More money than you wanted to spend.
As for details of this specific incident, I suspect they put mace or a toxic agent (perhaps some household cleaners mixed together) inside the air duct, which just happened to turn on when I was taking these assessment tests. In 1993, I actually notified Sylvan Learning Center about what had happened to me and I asked them if I could retake the assessment tests. They said I couldn't and that is one of the main reasons why I insisted to my parents that I had to stop going to Sylvan. They had refused me a second chance and I think I know why. Had I gone back to take the assessment tests again, I might have experienced another allergic reaction (or whatever the hell it was) and then I would have known what the hell was going on in that place.
If you don't think there is a VERY profitable market for tutoring, then go read the March 30, 1998 Newsweek magazine. The article you are looking for is on page 46. It's titled "The Tutoring Age." If Sylvan is using chemical agents to hinder the learning process, then it should be exposed. Their greed is justified in a way. They are the leading tutoring organization in North America and I'm sure they want to keep it that way. Greedy, monopolistic bastards.
By the time this was all over, my parents had spent something like 300 more dollars than they had originally budgeted.
It is my opinion that Sylvan Learning Center is a corrupt organization that does help students, but I think it helps the students more than they need helping. I sincerely hope that this was an isolated incident. If it wasn't, then this information should be posted to every education related newsgroup and mailed to every educator throughout the country. What happened to me in 1993 is a perfect example of how the education system in America today is corrupt and just plain misguided (that's putting it mildly, without the cuss words I feel like using).
This is also a perfect example of how today's modern education system in the United States of America is extremely beaurocratic and greedy.
If something like this has occured to you when you have been taking a government regulated test or when you have been tutored, then by all means, e-mail me and I will put it on the site. Thank you.
Click this sentence for another example of Sylvan's education market domination.