Having, being and higher education: the marketisation of the university and the transformation of the student into consumer

Students’ unions, consumerism and the neo-liberal university

“…The repositioning of universities as servants of the knowledge economy, and students as consumers, has been associated, Brady (2012) argues, with a sense of 'moral loss' within the higher education sector, 'with much human interaction in academic reduced to the banality of transactional exchange' (p.244). Molesworth et al (2009) contend that the inculcation of a consumer identity has brought about a more passive approach to learning, in which students place much more emphasis on their rights rather than their responsibilities, and on having a degree rather than being a learner, while empirical research has demonstrated the ways in which relationships between students within the classroom are often inflected with the values of competition and individualism (Brooks, 2007). Moreover, recent research has also pointed to the influence of neo-liberalism in spaces beyond the classroom.…”

The changing ethos of the university: living with supercomplexity

“…Throughout the world, authors such as Molesworth et al;2009) make the point that many universities over-emphasise and over-prioritise research outputs at the cost of teaching tasks because research outputs generate a great deal of revenue for the university. The recent revision of the national funding formula (the NFF) in South Africa is a case in point (DHET 2012).…”

“…The recent revision of the national funding formula (the NFF) in South Africa is a case in point (DHET 2012). Some universities may also reduce the hours of teaching, or may appoint less teaching staff, which results in a higher teacher/student ratio .All these measures gradually create a cost-effective mode of thinking, more conducive to situations of economies of scale which often favour reproductive learning instead of critical thinking and reflection and quality education (Molesworth et al 2009). Ramsden (2003) points out that the increased reliance on performance management systems, typically used in a corporate environment did not lead to quality in teaching and learning in Australian and UK universities; on the contrary, any external pressures formed an inadequate basis for enhancing quality in academia.…”

How can we confidently judge the extent to which student voice in higher education has been genuinely amplified? A proposal for a new evaluation framework

“…McLeod (2011, 186) argued: "Students, at least in my experience, are usually less won over by the rhetoric of inclusion and the romance of voice". Perhaps the PIE co-researcher was also not fooled by the marketisation of higher education, disguised as student voice (Naidoo and Jamieson 2007;Molesworth, Nixon and Scullion 2009). There would seem value therefore in evaluating the 'reach' of project aims and assumptions in terms of evaluating the extent to which all participants 'bought into' the aims, identified problems and assumptions of the project.…”