Comments on: Are students customers? http://caughtinplay.com/students-customers/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=students-customers the culture of entertainment Wed, 11 Jan 2012 14:46:41 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Peter Stromberg http://caughtinplay.com/students-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-230 Peter Stromberg Wed, 16 Dec 2009 19:58:42 +0000 http://caughtinplay.com/?p=316#comment-230 I agree that one could just go with the customer language, because in fact there are many different sorts of provider/customer relationships and they are often governed by different sorts of understandings. I suppose in one sense a patient is a doctor’s customer, but it’s not in the patient’s interest to think that therefore they control the transaction. Rather, you must grant the doctor some authority, and I think that’s true of a teacher as well. Thanks for reading and commenting, I'm happy to have thoughtful readers. I agree that one could just go with the customer language, because in fact there are many different sorts of provider/customer relationships and they are often governed by different sorts of understandings. I suppose in one sense a patient is a doctor’s customer, but it’s not in the patient’s interest to think that therefore they control the transaction. Rather, you must grant the doctor some authority, and I think that’s true of a teacher as well.

Thanks for reading and commenting, I’m happy to have thoughtful readers.

]]> By: James Bryant-Trerise http://caughtinplay.com/students-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-228 James Bryant-Trerise Wed, 16 Dec 2009 03:22:41 +0000 http://caughtinplay.com/?p=316#comment-228 As an instructor at a community college, I sometimes hear this point myself--and also, sometimes, from administrators. I suppose one way we could respond to the students who call themselves our customers is to say, "Yes, you are my customer, and to provide you with the excellent service you richly deserve, I require that you be in class on time. You're paying me to educate you, and educate you I shall." Or we can point to the astonishingly uncritical assumption inherent in the entire analogy: if you pay for something, you can do whatever you want with it. "This is my plastic fork, I paid for it, so you can't tell me not to jab it in your eye." "This is my education, I paid for it, so you can't tell me to do work." And of course, since I teach at a public school, I remind students that they are not the only ones who pay for their education. (No, I wasn't looking for the blog to be entertaining, but I was looking for it to be thoughtful. Got my wish.) As an instructor at a community college, I sometimes hear this point myself–and also, sometimes, from administrators. I suppose one way we could respond to the students who call themselves our customers is to say, “Yes, you are my customer, and to provide you with the excellent service you richly deserve, I require that you be in class on time. You’re paying me to educate you, and educate you I shall.”

Or we can point to the astonishingly uncritical assumption inherent in the entire analogy: if you pay for something, you can do whatever you want with it. “This is my plastic fork, I paid for it, so you can’t tell me not to jab it in your eye.” “This is my education, I paid for it, so you can’t tell me to do work.”

And of course, since I teach at a public school, I remind students that they are not the only ones who pay for their education.

(No, I wasn’t looking for the blog to be entertaining, but I was looking for it to be thoughtful. Got my wish.)

]]>