Universities, particularly research-intensive ones, have responded to a variety of external and internal influences by retooling their missions, culture, and organizational structures to generate revenue from market opportunities. This has resulted in the marketization of higher education: organizational practices that blur the boundary between knowledge-driven and profit-driven institutions. This blurring has spurred debates and uncertainties over the scope and boundaries of the 21st century university. We argue that these debates spring from institutional boundary work at the intersection of the three main missions of the contemporary academy: knowledge production, student learning, and satisfying the social charter. These missions can sometimes create areas of synergy, but also tensions that are particularly acute where market logics and business-oriented practices contradict academic values. Within knowledge production, a key dilemma is the extent to which knowledge advancement should aim for transcendence versus revenue generation. Within student learning, the dilemma involves incommensurability between the ideals of democratic citizenship and demonstrable return on investment. Within the social charter mission, the dilemma is over whether the university can serve the public welfare while also facilitating the growth of local and national economies.
This guide accompanies the following article: Daniel H. Nickolai, Steve G. Hoffman, and Mary Nell Trautner. 2012. ‘Can a Knowledge Sanctuary also be an Economic Engine? The Marketing of Higher Education as Institutional Boundary Work’, Sociology Compass 6(3):205–18. Authors’ introduction The marketing of higher education refers to a structural trend towards the adoption of market‐oriented practices by colleges and universities. These organizational practices blur the boundary between knowledge‐driven and profit‐driven institutions, and create tensions and contradictions among the three missions of the 21st‐century university: knowledge production, student learning, and satisfying the social charter. In this article, we highlight the historical contexts that nurtured the marketing of higher education in the US and Europe and explore the dilemmas that arise when market logics and business‐oriented practices contradict traditional academic values. We demonstrate that managing these dilemmas is a contested process of policing borders as institutional actors struggle to delineate the proper role of the university in a shifting organizational climate. Authors recommend Arum, Richard and Josipa Roksa. 2011. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. A book that asks a fundamental question in higher education: “How much are students actually learning?” The results do not reflect well on the institution. Arum and Roksa conduct longitudinal tests of critical thinking and analytic reasoning skills on a cohort of students at a variety of universities and colleges. They find that a majority of respondents demonstrate little to no improvement in learning outcomes. Even students who improve show modest gains. The authors’ analysis of student surveys suggests that a major culprit is a combination of low rigor in the curriculum, a lack of effort among students, and the overly modest expectations of instructors. Barnett, Ronald. 2010. ‘The Marketised University: Defending the Indefensible.’ Pp. 39–51 in The Marketisation of Higher Education and the Student as Consumer, edited by M. Molesworth, R. Scullion and E. Nixon. New York: Routledge. Barnett suggests that debates about the effects of marketization on higher education often reflect pre‐existing ideologies about the nature of markets in general. He presents numerous arguments in favor of the conception of students as consumers. For example, the increased power students receive in choosing where and from who to take classes may encourage accountability and actually improve the learning experience as students take a more active role in charting their own course through their education. Barnett also reminds readers that different institutions create different contexts and the extent to which market models of higher education are applicable are largely dependent on these different contexts. Berman, Elizabeth Popp. 2012. Creating the Market University: How Academic Science Became an Economic Engine. Princeton, NJ: Princeton ...
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.