In March I started attending New Horizons Computer Learning Center in an attempt to gain an A, Net, MCSA, Securities and Linux certificates and to being an internship making $15 an hour. I was led to believe that the schools would provide a hands on learning experience with some of the nations top PC instructors and that it was a learn at your own pace school. I was told that most students with no experience should be able to finish these courses in 6 months time and that should I have any questions all I had to do was ask. Having recently been laid off and having had previous PC experience it seemed like a no brainer to me that I should sign up. When I started taking my classes I was actually quite excited. I was introduced to my teacher for the first time whom seemed nice enough and was promptly sat in front of a PC. I was run through the initial set up of creating a user name and password and was told that I needed to place the head phones on my head as I was to start watching some videos first. For the first week I watched videos 4 hours a day and when I got home promptly started reading the book that was provided to me. On the following Monday I went in to start asking some questions that I had and was immediately refered to Wikipedia for my answers. At first I was a little confused about this as I had been told I would recieve a teacher and all I was getting was "look it up yourself". I learned rather quickly that if I didn't want to be kicked out of class that I should just sit there and take it. I did these things for an entire 2 months being led to believe that I was ready to take a pretest before the final certification exam and when the time came for the final exam I learned that I was in NO WAY ready to take that test. 2 solid months of reading and watching videos and I passed that test by the seat of my pants, literally, as I only passed by one question. Now knowing that the books and videos were basically junk to me I asked the teacher for other learning materials so that when I take the next class I may possibly be ready for that final exam. The other learning materials were placed on a disc and I was told that if I dont find the answers in the book that I should refer to the disc. When I got home I placed the disc into my CD-Rom and found out that all my teacher had done was to take a digital version of the book and burn it to CD. I was so angry I just snapped the disc and threw it into the garbage. The next time I went into the class I was really angry and told my teacher that if he didnt start doing something other than sit there I was going to complain higher up the food chain and the guy actually laughed at me. That was when I started to do everything from home. I figured why go in and watch videos that made me fall asleep if all it was doing was making me fall asleep... I tried the final exam a second time and failed again and was told that if I should choose to take the test again I would have to pay for it. Not having a job and realizing that this was going absolutely no where I asked if I could move onto the next class and I was allowed to. I didnt want to waste the money I had gotten a loan for so I was in it for the long haul whether I liked it or not. It took me another 2 months to get half way thru the next class so for a grand total of 8 months (2 months longer than I was told that the dumb ones could finish) Christmas break comes. Like most I wanted to take Christmas break off but it had already been long enough so I tried to call the school 2 days before christmas and didnt get an answer. Thinking things may actually be going my way I figured they were taking the holidays off and would resume after New years. On January 4th I drove to the school to find the parking lot empty, the lights off and the doors unlocked. I heard voices coming from inside and being completely irate I went in to find out who was there. Thankfully for them it was contractors that were shutting the power down for the entire building and setting it up for being empty. I asked them what happened and they said more or less that they were there one day and the next they were gone. Contacting New Horizons about the school closure was a joke as well. I came to find out that New Horizons itself is a franchised company so any problems I have with the one I was attending should be directed at the owner not the company. Funny didn't a lady in my state sue McDonalds the company and not the franchised outfit over spilled coffee? But anyways The owner was Gabriel Jaja whom as from what I can tell is a very influential person in Peoria and has just completely dropped from the face of the earth. I found out thru New Horizons that his franchise was dropped in December but still signed people up well after that and then knowing that the school was closed kept their money and left. Right now the loan is in forebearance or what ever its called and I have approx 4 months left until the full loan kicks in. The loan company is holding out as long as they can trying to decide what to do and I was actually told that they are trying to call the school to get confirmation. I guess school closure went right over their heads.
Anyways if you happen to see this stay as far away from New Horizons as you possibly can. Their classes are a joke, the tests are WAY harder than they make it out to be and should they close on you your basically screwed every which way but good.
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