November 1998

Related Links Are Students Our Customers in the Education Marketplace?

The Student as Customer: Other Points of View By Daniel Walsch In the past six years, the total enrollment at George Mason University has increased by approximately 4 percent from 20,829 in 1992 to 23,826 in 1997. The bulk of our students came from Northern Virginia, while approximately 12 percent came from the rest of Virginia, and the remaining nearly 16 percent were from out of state. Students came to George Mason with a variety of goals¬to further their education, pursue a college degree or degrees, upgrade their marketability, enhance their skills, or expand their knowledge base. But this is not a simple transaction of money for product between consumer and producer. How the students who have enrolled at George Mason have been, or even should be, viewed by members of the campus community has recently been the subject of discussion, and even debate, among the faculty. While some concede a similarity exists between a university student and a more traditional customer at, say, a local department store, and others argue that this kind of comparison is without merit, all agree that the relationship between the student and teacher is unique. "The relationship between student and teacher is one of those things that can't be categorized," says Linda Schwartzstein, a senior fellow within the Provost's Office. Lorna Irvine, another senior fellow within the Provost's Office, agrees. "We are all learning together, regardless of our station within the classroom," she explains. "I certainly don't think of students as customers but rather as people interested in a given topic; people interested in learning." The student­teacher relationship is a great deal more complicated than that of the traditional customer­salesperson interaction, adds Tyler Cowen, Center for the Study of Public Choice. A department store customer, for example, Cowen explains, "goes into the store, selects a piece of merchandise, buys it, and then leaves. At a university, however, the so-called customer--the student--stays. Not only do students interact with other 'customers,' but they collaborate with the salespeople--the faculty--in ongoing efforts to improve the ultimate product of education." Teachers who view students as "just customers or clients," he says, are selling short the contribution that students can, and often do, make to the overall well-being of the university or college. At the September faculty meeting, President Alan Merten, in response to comments from the faculty, agreed that, while the role of a university student goes beyond that of mere learner, a more clear-cut definition has yet to be reached by scholars or academicians. At a minimum, he noted, the student is both customer and product. Esther Elstun, Modern and Classical Languages and chair of the Faculty Senate, however, criticizes attempts to view students as customers. "In my view, it is entirely inappropriate to use the language of commerce with reference to educational institutions and processes," she says. "To do so is to overlook or ignore an essential difference between the teacher­student relationship and the salesperson­customer relationship. "When someone sells me a car," she continues, "he or she may form some privately held opinions about me, but that person has no professional responsibility to evaluate and judge my performance as a customer/ buyer. To speak of education as the 'produce' we 'sell' is to equate it with consumer goods; the differences may be difficult to articulate, but we all know that they exist and that they are somehow very important. "A consumer good may make a person's life more comfortable, but it cannot improve a human being the way a good education can," she adds. This perspective from "inside the classroom," however, varies from one held by the university's primary recruitment office, which views much of campus life from "outside the classroom." "Students are our customers, and customer satisfaction is our top priority," says Patricia Riordan, dean of admissions. Further, she adds, the Office of Admissions is currently more customer-driven than it has been in 15 years as it attempts to address the individual needs and goals of prospective students and then match them with the needs of the region and overall campus environment. "In the mid-1980s, admissions offices had a more gatekeeper mentality, where we pretty much approved people as they came in. But now, we are much more in a marketing environment," Riordan says. "In fact, you will never see us go back to the way we used to be." She recognizes that her perspective varies from that of the teacher, but believes the two complement each other. Says Riordan, "Our product is education."