New book on for-profit universities: "Lower Ed"

Time again when I browse negative professor reviews on ratemyprofessors.com, the overwhelming majority of negative reviews say almost exactly that same thing. There's also frequently some mention that the professor is "confusing" and/or "unorganized" to go along with it.

 

"Frustrated that we've damn near made the terms "student" and "customer" synonymous without any clarity or distinction between the two."

I remember 1992 well. The day Total Quality Management took over my small campus. I remember because I was called out for talking to my table-mates about my engagement ring instead of listening to the presentation. Shame on me.

 

You're bound to run into a sociopath wherever you teach. The thing that will make the difference for the morale of instructors is how administrators handle situations. If they have the view that students are customers and the customer is always right, then you'll end up having the students run the school.

That's pretty much what happened at the NA school I taught at. Students who had no idea what criminal justice was were leading the Director of Education to pressure the instructors into doing pointless activities. We took field trips that were meant for K-12 children. Our clueless chair did mock crime scenes that were far from realistic because our director didn't want to pay for supplies. If the students wanted all of that, then they needed to work harder to get into a traditional school with labs and field trips to the body farm.

But, most irritating was that many of the students thought they were going to be in a police academy-type environment because that's what the admissions reps told them. Sorry, but CJ is a social science and did not belong at a career school.

 

While this is true it is also true that many traditional B&M schools are doing exactly that without using the word "customer."

Their view being that the college experience is to be enjoyed and that the student should is owed a certain degree of deference.

Naturally, some schools do it better than others. My wife briefly taught as an adjunct at a so-called "Public Ivy" where, when she recommended a student for tutoring assistance due to what was likely an undiagnosed learning disability, she was reprimanded. The student was offended that my wife had the audacity to suggest she needed additional help just because her papers appeared to have been written by a third grader (and one who had never learned about punctuation at that). The student never got the help she needed. Her feelings mattered more than the fact that she needed help.

Even at my own alma mater, the University of Scranton, we had a provost with a poster outside of his office advertising his services to students. Among them? "Don't agree with your grade? Come in and talk to me." A professor, and later friend, would told me years after I was out of the place that the provost used to drive professors nuts urging them to up the grade of pretty much everyone who complained.

That, of course, is only the academic side.

The social side is even worse. I was recently watching some of those hidden camera videos from elite universities. Most of them are horrible hatchet jobs. But I was a bit surprised at how many advisors, administrators and faculty members they found who were willing to shred, rip up or burn a copy of the U.S. constitution because a student (with a hidden camera) told them that the constitution triggered them. That's pandering to a customer even if you never call them a "customer."

Worse than making the life of faculty hell it also sets up these students for unrealistic expectations when they graduate. How can you expect someone to find a job and thrive in a corporate setting when they come from an environment where going over someone else's head literally gets you whatever you want every single time?

 

https://www.1843magazine.com/data-graphic/what-the-numbers-say/higher-earning

A university education might expand your mind. It will also fatten your wallet. Data from the OECD, a club of rich countries, show that graduates can expect far greater lifetime earnings than those without a degree.
The size of this premium varies. It is greatest in Ireland, which has a high GDP per head and rising inequality. Since 2000 the unemployment rate for under-35s has swelled to 8% for those with degrees – but to more than 20% for those without, and nearly 40% for secondary school drop-outs. The country’s wealth now goes disproportionately to workers with letters after their names.

Low income taxes help. Irish graduates keep most of their earnings, as do Americans. Students in the United States also reap hefty returns due to a shortage of skilled labour (chart, below). Demand is substantial: the use of maths in the workplace is 10% greater than the OECD average. The supply is limited, since Americans are not particularly numerate. College graduates stand to gain.

Students in former Eastern Bloc countries also benefit from scarcity in the labour market, thanks to a historical lack of tertiary education. On average, one in four 55-year-olds in an OECD nation has a degree. In Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and the Czech Republic it is closer to one in seven. But the university gates have opened wide: the proportion of Poles aged 25-34 with a degree tripled between 2000 and 2012.
Freshmen in Benelux and Nordic countries have less to celebrate. Getting a degree in these countries takes a long time, and therefore means missing out on more wages. The general population is well-educated and taxes are high. The boost in earnings for a Norwegian graduate is half as big as for a Czech, and he will pay 50% more into the government’s coffers.*

 

While this certainly can be a hindrance to the learning experience, a distraction, and difficult to account for by the person with the alleged condition, is simply firing them always the appropriate response? To what extent should institutions be (if they had not done so) offering assistance to people suffering from such conditions? Sure, there are more and more PhDs floating around these days, but are there so many that those with substance abuse problems can simply be cast aside?

 

Okay, we start with a quote from “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist,” from Avenue Q:

Now, more to the subject matter . . .

There’s been so much discussion of Lower Ed in this thread and, as I mentioned previously, I happened to hear the NPR interview with Tressie McMillan Cottom, so I decided to do what most of you have not done: read the actual book.

Having worked for two for-profit schools prior to earning her own doctorate (from the very reputable Emory U.) and becoming an assistant professor of sociology at the very reputable Virginia Commonwealth U., Tressie certainly brings some presuppositions to the subject. And, being Black and female, she brings additional presuppositions to her conclusions, as well as a focus on minorities (who, in fact, are financially victimized by the higher education system). So what’s the problem with that? We all write based on our presuppositions.

That said, I found her views to be well thought out and very well researched. She discusses her methodologies in detail, and they all appear to comport with accepted social science research protocols. She does not trash all for-profit schools, and the book is chock full of primary source research that documents her positions quite well.

In short, I happen to agree with her conclusions, keeping in mind that I’ve always been predisposed against for-profit schools. Others (Neuhaus comes to mind) may disagree with her conclusions, but that is often because they attended, graduated from, or even work at for-profit schools.

(A similar illustration comes to mind: The people who are most against clean energy are coal miners who would lose their jobs if coal is devaluedl Are you a coal miner? Then you likely think, “Obama bad, Trump good.” Even to the point of being “single issue” about it.)

Personally, I found the book to be 100% on the nose. But then, I already shared her many of her opinions before I read it. On the other hand, my opinions are based on perception; her opinions are firmly grounded in empirical research.

Tressie brilliantly documents how “enrollment counselors” are essentially sales reps whose goal is to ultimately close the sales. And you find a lot more of them in the for-profit arena than in the non-profit arena. There are exceptions, of course – you’ll even find a hard-sell approach in some non-profit schools (SNHU comes to mind).

The bottom line, however, is that whatever basis you judge Tressie on – whether it’s because she’s Black, female, liberal, an activist, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, Lower Ed is a book that stands quite well on its own. And before you pontificate on the book itself, you should, at the least, read it. For what it’s worth, it’s a great read. Even if she doesn’t directly call for-profits the spawn of Satan. Like I do.
:saevilw:

 

That school did not care that much about their employees, and our health insurance was terrible.

 

Thanks for posting and I am also working my way through the book. A bit different than what one would expect based solely off of the assumptions of the board so far.

 

Thank you for the thorough review. I'm probably going to read the book when I have time. Considering the connection between education and earnings and the fact that for-profits attract a disproportionate number of minority students, this is an appropriate topic for a sociologist to cover. I am, too, a black woman. I came from an economically disadvantaged background and taught many Hispanic students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Knowing the barriers that they and I faced, I think a sociologist might be the most appropriate person to cover this topic from a perspective that has been largely ignored.

 

You're lucky, as I find the nonsense idea the prevailing attitude amongst most people I've come across. In my view, it's a major part of what has kept the machine going.