Pushy parents offer 'gifts' to advance their child's cause

Sydney

In more innocent times, school pupils thanked their favourite teacher with chocolates, flowers or maybe a homemade cake, but Sydney's pushy parents are now offering the type of 'inducements' that would make a Washington lobbyist wince.

School principals report that they are regularly showered with lavish gifts - such as expensive restaurant meals, cases of wine, theatre tickets, gold pens and even overseas holidays - by parents desperate to advance the prospects of their un-academic offspring.

Sydneysiders are currently gripped by the story of a Chinese migrant couple, Qinghua Pei and Xiaodong Lu, who have admitted to an anti-corruption tribunal that they offered substantial cash payments to their son's teacher in the hope that he would gain entry to one of the city's better high schools.

Jodie-Lee Pearce, a teacher at Westmead Public School, told the tribunal the couple handed over wads of banknotes - with the amounts varying from A$500 (HK$2,500) to A$2,000 - in an attempt to gain their son a place at one of Sydney's selective high schools. Teachers in the state school system cannot accept gifts worth more than A$50.

Mr Pei believed his young son (who cannot be named for legal reasons) was destined to become a great scientist, but was being held back by his poor grades in English. He asked Ms Pearce to give his son a 'favourable consideration' in her school assessment.