Re: Students and Tests - Kyle and business models

[David Dockstader <DRDOCK00@UKCC.UKY.EDU>]

On Tue, 10 Dec 1996 11:51:11 -0500 kyle forinash said:
> The sleaziest part of higher education is when we take money from
> underprepared students and tell them they can make it when in fact they
> cannnot (without more preperation). ...
I certainly agree and I loose a lot of sleep over this one.  However, at the
same time, if we offer, but do not require courses which can provide what
the students need they try to avoid the courses because they won't count
toward graduation.

> The main problem with thinking of education as a service industry is that I
> can think of no other service where the quality of the service is almost
> totally determined by the provider rather than the customer (no matter if
> you think the customer is the student or the company that hires him or her,
> or the tax payer). For better or worse, we, as "providers" set standards
> and monitor our own quality. I really don't see how it can be otherwise.
> Supposidly we are the most knowledgible about our particualr subject and
> therefor best capable of determining what someone else (students) needs to
> know about that subject and I don't see a way around that.
Lots of businesses run this way.  Doctors, lawyers, utilities...
>