Students: Consumers of Educational Products

Robert Jensen's article Delivering Educational Products: The Job Formerly Known as Teaching in the Texas Observer scores points! He attended session with reps from the Center for Educational Freedom (the Cato Institute) and the Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CCAP) who spoke about education as a commodity. He says in current discussions of the modern university "much to eliminate critical thinking that is connected to struggles for political and economic justice. The victory of the market model would be the end of real education, if by education we mean independent inquiry into the power that structures our lives." P.S. The Center for Educational Freedom has the express purpose of moving toward a "future when state-run schools give way to a dynamic, independent system of schools competing to meet the needs of American children." Let's hear it for the end of public education! The CCAP deals with "the burden that colleges impose on society." The affordability group is pushing for-profit education since "for-profit education serves other important functions, such as introducing a market-based approach to education and providing much needed competition for traditional colleges and universities." I have a feeling that they'd like to take my tax dollars that go toward federal grants and toward supporting state universities and throw it to for-profit higher education. Oh dear!