Week 7: Education

Immediately when I started the reading for this week I was reminded of a Frontline episode that I saw a few months ago called College, Inc. It was an interesting investigation of for profit colleges and it discussed many of the same issues that these readings do. It is on Netflix if you want it in full but it is also on youtube, the link is; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJSPkXiVDhE

I am unsure if I agree with for-profit educational institutions . Education is something that almost everyone wants, it allows for better life chances and allows people the opportunity to make much larger incomes over their lifetimes. I think it is dangerous to view education as a commodity and students as a market, but this is a reality, even outside of the for-profit college sector. Marketing techniques used by colleges make a mockery of the education they offer, I am always amazed that the University of Oregon feels that it needs a commercial to attract students, I would hope that students come to this school for it's academic programs not because we have an alluring commercial and a good football team. In class a few weeks ago someone in class who is a cold caller for the alumni center mentioned that after we win football games people donate to our school, this made me very sad. Commercials like this make it seem like having an education has a monetary value, to me this idea is a total destruction of the moral and ethical value of eduction, I think that my education is something that is too abstract to be defined by a numeric value, yet I fear that monetary value is the only way society can understand what value education has. It seems that many people have a difficult time understanding what value exists in things that don't have a price, things like health, education, and social welfare. It is a sign that capitalism has infiltrated our morality and that a culture of thought exists where it is acceptable for everything and anyone to be bought. We have to ask ourselves if we want to live in a nation that mass-produces education. The dangers of doing this are the same dangers associated with mass-producing any other good, you sacrifice quality for quantity. This kind of idea could essentially erode the meaning of higher education in the United States, all together. 

These for-profit colleges serve a population that otherwise might go uneducated, so in this sense it is positive, it offers people who did not do well in high school a chance at a college education, which could be life changing.  However, I wonder if it actually does them much good, in the article, Subprime Opportunity it mentioned that these schools graduate very few students and students who do attend have to take out large loans to pay for the expensive tuition, leaving most of them with an enormous amount of debt by graduation. The article, Fed Up at the University of Phoenix, provided a great example of what happens when profit is intermingled with an educational institution. Many student have complained that University of Phoenix engages in predatory recruiting that targets low income families that can’t pay for school with out loans, its as if they have a deal with the credit card companies or something, it seems like these businesses are more like snake oil salesmen than educational institutions and I feel  a lot of sympathy for the people who were promised quality educations that would lead to successful careers and were failed by the for-profit system. 

I hope that the for-profit college bubble will burst in 2011. I think that what these organizations do more to hurt their students than to help them, by making unrealistic promises of a bright future and recruiting students who they know are under qualified. They only cement the cycle of debt that is already a problem in the United States. It doesn’t take a for-profit business to recognize that there is a need for higher education that is not being filled. There are thousands of students who want access to a good education, many of them have been failed by the public and private school systems in k-12 and then taken advantage of by the for-profit system in college. I think that this weeks reading indicate a need for a reform of both public and private school systems on every level. The fact is that the public system fails to provide low-income children with the education they want and deserve, a good primary school education is essential to access to a quality college education and a successful career. Our system needs to be rebuilt from the top down, which is not an easy job exemplified by the constant changing of staff in the U.S. department of education. Problems with greed and money have infiltrated the public school system as well, with teachers who refuse to give up tenure and often refuse to properly educate, public education these days is beginning to resemble more and more this for-profit model. 

The chapter on education in the book was very interesting, I think what many non-profit private schools and charter schools are doing really amazing things with k-12 education. I did my assignment for this class on KIPP a charter school that provides quality education to low income children by making a six day school week with longer days, the education offered at KIPP surpasses some of the best public and private schools in the nation. Their success rates are amazing and I hope to see both public and private schools move in this direction.  Here is their website, they have schools all over the nation and what they have achieved is really inspiring…http://www.kipp.org/