Universities are funded, more or less, for bums on seats. Whether it's paid for by the taxpayers or parents, fees are paid for time present on the premises, It's paid just like day care, but without the Lego.
But what we're paying for - time on campus - isn't what we want to buy. What would happen if Universities were paid for outcomes? What if Universities were paid a balloon payment for each employment outcome, weighted in line with the graduates starting salary.
Suddenly, pointless degrees that are cheap to deliver but go nowhere are a liability and go out the window. Universities fight tooth and nail for the best and brightest that can be placed quickly. They need to be sharp, and make sure they are teaching the skills employers really need. The careers office moves to the centre of the institution, instead of stuffed into a far corner beside Classics. The Alumni network is no longer simply a set of people to shake down for checks - a lead on a good jobfor an undergrad would be worth much more.
Life skills like communication become central, as they greatly enhance the saleability of the student. Even student activities, often funded but ignored, but a key aspect in rounding out a good saleable CV, take on a new importance.
Timing would become critical. If you have a bright girl in second year who could get a good job, should you try to place her, or convince her to stay for another year, to get a better salary. There are options at the bottom too. Taking in disadvantaged students in large numbers, and making them employable might help the bottom line considerably. Outcome payments could be weighted to favour placing disadvantaged students ('fixer uppers' if you will) over easy to place smart kids from good homes.
The institution that would be produced would be as different from the university of today as the shark from the whale, a lean mean beast ruthless in it's hunt for the best careers for it's students. Would I send my daughter there? I might. Would it be a more effective use of taxpayers money? You bet.
In a sense, this happens for research already. Departments and Institutions which fail to turn out demonstrably good outputs tend to find it hard to win grants and sustain their funding down the line. Good results help to win the next grant, and success build on success. There are very few disciples which avoid this and manage to produce large amounts of unneeded research ("I have a little list, they never will be missed") but they are the happy exception.
It's a radical idea, but being radical is not itself a fault. Like most such ideas, the devil is in the details. There are a number of obvious problems, which I shall leave as an exercise for the commenter. But at least it would align what we want - people with useful skills who can find a place in the world, with what we're paying for, and remove the incentive to underfund potentially expensive courses which lead to decent careers, and shortchange important skills, while supporting cheap degrees that shift hundreds of people from lecture hall to exam hall for four years, to no obvious benefit to anyone except keeping them off the unemployment rolls.
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What if Universities were paid a balloon payment for each employment outcome, weighted in line with the graduates starting salary.
ReplyDeleteSuddenly, pointless degrees that are cheap to deliver but go nowhere are a liability and go out the window.
Only a complete philistine would even propose such a daft idea. Newsflash: the purpose of universities is not job training. What kind of an uneducated cretin could propose that a degree in, say, philosophy is "pointless." There's a whole puerile philosophy contained in such a view, but I wouldn't expect you'd know about that. It's not a "radical" idea, in any case, no matter how much self-flattery you lather on yourself. It's the least radical idea out there: man is nothing but an economic creature and the ultimate question to which everything must respond is "can I eat it?"
Thanks for your comment, between us, we've hit the nail/screw on the head.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the true purpose of the University?
We're at opposite poles of view here, Utilitarian vs. Idealistic. There's a whole book or three in unpacking that issue.
The fact is most people who attend university do so with the principle purpose of making themselves employable. Their purpose, when they have explicitly considered one, is utilitarian.
So whatever Universities are supposed to be for, that is what we as a society principally use them for, rightly or wrongly. Perhaps we may be using a hammer to drive screws, but if we are, let's at least recognise that reality and not delude ourselves and put on airs.
Finally, I suspect plenty of people with Philosophy degrees have excellent jobs. A Philosophy degree from a respected source is not a bad preparation for life, and may employers will recognise that. They would also perhaps agree that "Can I eat that" might not be our ultimate question, but it is our first question.
The fact is most people who attend university do so with the principle purpose of making themselves employable.
ReplyDeleteMost people who attend university do so to get laid. By your logic, we should turn the universities into bordellos.
I fear the 'education as job training' is too reductionist. There are several assumptions underpinning it. Since students choose a course after leaving cert (and may be streamed from junior cert) it is assumed that they will know what job they want (or what type of job they want). At the other end employers generally enage in direct training (as opposed to the generic training at third level). An approach which reduces a third level education to employability - and this would follow from a balloon payment linked to jobs - would have the effect of removing courses without a clear career path for graduates and at a lower level would reduce each lecture to 'is it coming up in the exam?'.
ReplyDeleteIt would indeed create the risk of Universities tailoring degrees to what they think employers want. On the other hand, employers say they want people who can work in teams, think independently, communicate and so on. It may emerge be the case that the oft maligned Philosophy degrees and their like provide a better long term grounding that a BSc in Last Years Buzzword. Over time, the numbers would build to back this up, and smart students will take note.
ReplyDeleteA good adjustment might be to weight the balloon payment to the first 5 years salary, rather than purely the starting salary, to encourage a longer term view.