What's up, I'm a former "student" of this former "school" and I can confidently say it was the biggest fraud I've ever been a part of. Of course, loathe to say, I was on the undesirable part of the fraud. I find it downright disturbing to hear about Bob's 2.5 million dollar annual revenue. The kids lived in 3 small trailers, and 1 somewhat nicer lodge. I was only there for 11 months, and as more kids came (thus more money) I saw nothing but degradation in our quality of life (food, housing, discipline), BUT I saw 4 or 5 staff members BUY NEW SUVS. Calling this place an institution of learning (Academy?) is a flat out lie. I all but dropped out of highschool half way through my junior year, and I knew far more about the topics these "Teachers" were "teaching". I was less prepared for college after being at Wellspring than I was before. At least my teachers gave me C's for not doing a damn thing in public school, not A+'s.
Can we talk about our "College counselor" for a minute? Sure, let's do that. There were a select few of us who wanted to go to college after this place, and even fewer of us who had the brainpower to actually do it. However, I for one didn't know anything about picking the right college. I'd never thought about it, I didn't know where to start. Valorie Cook, the ever vigilant financier cum career counselor, extended herself so far as to hand out college brochures from her bookshelf. That's it. The criteria for what brochures to hand out? "what state do you want to be in?" And what about scholarship? I was a National Merit Scholarship finalist, I had a 1330 SAT score, she didn't even mention scholarships to me. I could have gotten a free ride through college.
After shoveling out 50 grand for this school, my parents were in no mood to pay for my college experience. I lost 10,000 dollars going to
college. My money. Valorie (or was it my parents?) convinced me to enroll in an advanced Calculus class my first semester, seeing as how I did so well in the "precalculus" class I took at wellspring. I've taken a class like that before. I was in seventh grade, it was called algebra. Needless to say, the calculus did not go so well. Now, I can't blame my failure at college entirely on Wellspring, that would be juvenile. But it's perfectly reasonable that a 50,000 dollar, one year education should be at least equal to a free one? Am I right? No? Ok, maybe that's that "New World" thinking that Bob was talking about: Advertise, promise, charge. Notice it doesn't include deliver.
