Hong Kong couple sue US professor after sons' Harvard rejection
They allegedly gave educator more than US$2 million to get their two sons into school
A Hong Kong couple are suing a US-based college admissions consultant for failing to get their two sons into Harvard University as he had allegedly promised, according to reports.
The couple, who have been named as Gerald and Lily Chow by The Boston Globe, said in their suit filed in US District Court in Boston that they gave Mark Zimny, a former Harvard professor who ran the education consultancy group IvyAdmit Consulting, US$2.2 million to get their sons into an elite American university, preferably Harvard.
Reports said that Zimny agreed in 2007 to help the Chows' two sons, then aged 16 and 14.
He would provide tutoring to the two children while they attended American preparatory schools, and offered to "grease the admission wheels", funnelling donations to elite colleges while also investing on the Chows' behalf.
A detailed written plan states "our target university is Harvard", according to the Globe.
Zimny got to know the Chows five years ago at a ceremony at a Massachusetts prep school where one of the Chow boys was enrolled.