Charles Halton at Awilim has an interesting post on the for profit education model of “schools” such as the University of Phoenix. In referencing a New York Times article, he discusses some of the problems the school is having. He hits part of the nail on the head when he points the finger at

the incentive to offer the lowest quality education it can get by with while attracting the highest number of students in order to maximize profit.

While I think many of their problems do stem from trying to maximize profits, I am sure the “University” of “Phoenix” also suffers from one of the problems that faces many traditional universities: the problem of credentialing.

Education has traditionally been about changing the person who is learning. The goal of the education is not to acquire a specific skill set related to one particular career. Instead, the goal is the development of the student into a person who is able to ask and answer questions about the world. Education should create a critical thinker who is able to analyze all experiences and encounters by drawing on a large body of knowledge. It should also create people who are inherently curious about the world and know how to continue learning on their own.

Today, however, many students enter college because having a degree will increase their ability to get hired and get a higher paying job. They want the credentials to get a job. And quite a few of our colleges are selling themselves this way. For those of you who work at a college, how many of your admissions departments talk to students about their ability to get a better job with a college education?

Such students are less willing to sit through classes that don’t seem immediately relevant to their careers. I heard this all the time from business majors at LCC. They saw no need for Bible classes because they were not going to work in a religious field. But I have heard it at other colleges as well, where students lament that they have to learn things that they are “not going to use.”

I suspect the University of Phoenix draws an even higher number of these students than a traditional university. For one thing, they market themselves that way. They state up front that their degree will help you get a better job while allowing you to continue advancing in the career you are currently in by not asking that you stop working to get an education. While this is not necessarily the root of the University of Phoenix’s trouble, I suspect it contributes.

Of course, since many of us teach at religious colleges and seminaries, I suppose we could be guilty of educating for prophets.

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