LU PING/CHINA DAILY

An increasing number of Chinese students in their early teens are being sent to study overseas as parents eye the benefits of a good head start

His daughter is only 15 years old this year but Wen Hong, who hails from Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, believes it is already time for her to venture outside of China for a better education.

"It is very hard to say whether it is good or bad to study abroad at an early age, but I believe it's better for a teenager to start earlier and receive the balanced influence of Chinese and Western culture," said Wen, a father of two.

The plan was put into motion about a year ago when Wen Qing was a junior in second grade. After discussing the pros and cons of an overseas education, Wen－who had spent six months applying for the enrollment himself－said his daughter was keen to study in Canada.

With regard to pursuing a professional career overseas following the completion of her studies in university, Wen said he has left the decision in his daughter's hands, adding that his job was merely to '"open the window" for her.

"Wen Qing decided that she wanted to enter as a ninth-grader (the first year of high school) student in Canada even before she graduated from middle school in China. She wishes to get away from the stressful study life here," said Wen.

Other factors include her preference for Canada over the United States－the choice destination of many Chinese－and the fact that it is more economical in the former. Wen, a medical professional, will be spending 20,000 Canadian dollars, or about 97,770 yuan, every year on his daughter's tuition fees and insurance expenses. An education in the US will cost substantially more.

Teng Zheng, deputy general manger of Shanghai CIIC Education International, an agency that helps arrange for Chinese students to study abroad, said that Canadian secondary schools are getting more applicants from China because it's a logical choice－Canada has the same education system as the US but it costs less.

Nevertheless, the US is still the top destination for Chinese students, followed by Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia. According to the 2014 Open Doors Report issued by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the US State Department, there were 274,439 Chinese students studying in the US in the 2013/14 academic year, up 16.5 percent from the previous year.

Chinese students now make up 31 percent of the international student community in the US, and their numbers have grown steadily for seven years.

The number of Chinese teenagers studying in the US has also increased by more than 60 times in the past decade. A total of 23,795 Chinese students were studying at US senior schools during the 2012-2013 school year.

This represented a staggering 365-fold increase from just seven years ago, according to the Annual Report on the Development of Chinese Students Studying Abroad, which was published by China's Social Sciences Academic Press in 2014.