First Idea: In the introduction to The New Education we read “In the last decade, it has become fashionable to say higher education would be more efficient and modern if were run as a business, treating students as “customers.” (pos. 230). The author accurately presents some of the historical roots of the “buisinefication” of higher education, like the prioritization of “practical” jobs, the cuts on the budget for the Humanities, and the believe that only the STEM can lead to good productive jobs and economic growth. However, whatever the motivations or the ideologies behind the criticism to higher education, I agree with the author that the diagnosis that “college is out-of-date is partially correct, but their prescription fail.” (pos. 211) It failed because, among other reasons, the students that have the luck and the privilege to access “higher” education in the United States are already convinced that they should be treated as customers, and, as we say in Colombia “the customer is always right”, “el cliente siempre tiene la razón.”
One of my students sent me an email last week after receiving her midterm participation grade, she wrote “I am almost sure my grade is a mistake…” Y pensé, “wow… esta estudiante se siente empoderada y segura de que puede quejarse de su nota, e incluso insinuar que yo soy la equivocada porque sabe que el sistema la localizó en una posición de poder”. She is not a bad student, she had a B, and still knowing the requirements of the class, she felt entitled to demand a “better service”… “This meal doesn’t taste like I expected, please give me a better one. I’m paying.” Es decir, “Learning doesn’t seem part of the business plan” (pos. 236).
From my Colombian perspective, “qué se cree esta niñita malcriada, vino aquí a aprender y que más aprendizaje que tener responsabilidades adultas y cumplir con ellas” pero en Estados Unidos no se puede decir eso, hay que infantilizar a los alumnos, hay que darles premios y caritas felices en el quiz, y ni se te ocurra acércate mucho, porque te acusan de acoso, y se acabó tu carrera en la academia. Lo siento, el proyecto del libro es bueno, pero hay que comenzar por desinfatilizar a los muchachos, por que esa es la fuente del clientelismo americano. “These students are not children”
To that idea, a second thought…
Second Idea: My father asking why haven’t I brought a house yet, “you get a decent salary, right? you are almost 30…” pues papá, “I know I work in a reputable higher education institution, but I can’t pay for a house, I have a mediocre health insurance, and no maternity leave benefits.. no warrantees of life quality for a family, and of course, no money for a house”, in other words, “students are guided through their college by professors who have no job security; likely, neither will the students when they graduate” (pos. 235).
Third Idea: No me gusta la palabra revolución. Is the right tactic to name this project “a revolution”? Can we think of a “movement” without going back to the historical idea of the “revolution”? I know this concern with the word “revolution” is completely personal, but isn’t a “revolution” suggesting a substitution of hierarchies, what if we stick to the word “movement” and “relationality”, “flux” between agents?