Student-as-client

Metaphors help us understand students’ role in education. Are students products, consumers, or clients?

In Democracy and Education, John Dewey calls active student engagement an essential factor of learning and education. “Making the individual a sharer or partner in the associated activity so that he feels its success as his success, its failure as his failure, is the completing step,” Dewey writes (1916, p. 14). Though Dewey comments on the social environment, his philosophies can naturally extend to the school environment, which he calls the “chief agency” for social progress (p. 20). In this way of thinking, students are partners in the educational process, particularly in K-12 education reform in the U.S.

The No Child Left Behind law, the Race to the Top grants, and the Common Core State Standards together tell us that Americans badly want change in education. But many of these reforms have a common deficiency: They fail to account for a student’s responsibility in his or her education.

Few reforms mention the role of students. Much of K-12 educational reform is guided by student achievement as measured by standardized assessment data — a limited gauge of academic capacity — and the focus on change has fallen heavily on teachers. When the student is considered, two metaphors have emerged over time: Student-as-Product and Student-as-Consumer (McMillan & Cheney, 1996; Tight, 2013).

But these metaphors are incomplete. In each, too much weight is placed on teachers and too little on students’ accountability for their own learning. We propose a third metaphor: Student-as-Client, which more accurately captures the value and responsibilities of teachers and students in education. While the Student-as-Client metaphor has had many applications in higher education (Carger, 1996; Lee, 1996; Riessman, 1988), the metaphor has not been used to understand K-12 education reform efforts.

Student-as-Product

The Student-as-Product metaphor envisions the student as a product of the education system (Ramirez, 1999; Tight, 2013). In other words, as students move through the system, they acquire skills and knowledge that enable them to become productive members of society; federal and state standardized test scores demonstrate whether students have acquired the skills and knowledge the system promises. This method has roots as early as the mid-1800s (Ramirez, 1999). Yet today’s K-12 students still take a flurry of high-stakes tests that are also being used to evaluate and inform teacher performance. Funding and resources provided to schools are linked to test performance as well.

Students must not be seen as problems, products, or customers but valued as crucial partners in learning.

The Student-as-Product metaphor closely aligns with reforms that link student assessment with teacher performance (Ramirez, 1999). Teachers are pressured to ensure that the “product” is the highest quality. If the product is defective, then the teacher is at fault and enters a strenuous evaluation process, risking dismissal without improvement to their practices and products. Ramirez notes that this view of reform assumes teachers are either inadequately skilled or lack the motivation to increase student achievement and therefore must be retrained or replaced (1999).

Reform models in Florida and Colorado align with the Student-as-Product metaphor. Florida awards public schools a letter grade based on student performance on the Florida Comprehensive Achievement Test (FCAT). Districts that receive an A or B or demonstrate improvement in grades are rewarded with cash grants. In May 2010, Colorado passed the Great Teachers and Leaders bill, which ties 50% of a teacher’s evaluation to student scores on standardized achievement assessments. Both state initiatives assume that teacher appraisal and punishment are “successful drivers” of reform (Fullan, 2001).  We profoundly disagree with this assessment. Student achievement involves many factors beyond the teacher’s capacity to teach or motivate; a student’s failure should not be blamed solely on the teacher.

The Student-as-Product metaphor and related reform policies fail to account for the fact that students and teachers function within particular institutional and societal structures and barriers. Currently, teachers and administrators are accountable to outside stakeholders, such as parents, the wider teaching profession, and public policy, without having sustainable and supportive professional learning communities for improvement. The Student-as-Product metaphor suggests that merely attaching monetary consequences to teachers and schools will raise student performance on standardized tests. However, feedback to teachers and, presumably, improvements in student achievement are effective only when embedded within a supportive environment of differentiated professional development to improve areas of deficiency. Beyond the scope of tests and assessments, the Student-as-Product metaphor fails to recognize reform as a systematic issue.

Student-as-Consumer

Another metaphor identifies students not as the product but as consumers in the education market (Riessman, 1988; McMillan & Cheney, 1996). The metaphor is influenced by rational choice theory, particularly parents’ rational choices regarding which school their children will attend (Beal & Hendry, 2012). The metaphor redefines education as a private, rather than public good: A market-based environment forces schools to compete for students (and the federal monies associated with them) by providing a higher-quality product or a specific program that reaches certain community needs or values (e.g. Montessori, bilingual and dual language, core knowledge, arts-focused, etc.).

Proponents of this metaphor seek reforms that target consumer needs and wants. Schools are then run more like businesses marketing themselves to be more responsive to customer demands and ultimately aiming to increase their customer base. An application of this metaphor can be found in policies advocated by the Foundation for Excellence in Education. A key element of their reform agenda is that “families need the financial freedom to attend schools that meet their needs” (Foundation for Excellence in Education, 2013, para. 7). However, an analysis of three education markets found that while the policy goal for school choice is to create better educational opportunities for all children regardless of socioeconomic status, some schools (specifically, profit-oriented charter schools) are more willing to pay premiums to settle in geographic areas with preferred (i.e. affluent) student enrollments (Lubienski, Gulosino, & Weitzel, 2009).

The notion of preferred student enrollments also brings into question the actual customer base. Students receive the education, but parents are the financial decision makers, the customers being wooed by schools. There may be incongruence between parent demands and students’ best interests in education. In addition, the Student-as-Consumer metaphor implies that a student or parent may feel entitled to tell the teacher what to do or teach because they are the main contributors to school funding. Even in public charters and open-enrollment public schools with special programs, the parent community feels entitled to more decision-making power than parents of conventional public schools because they made the choice to enroll their children (and the federal monies associated with them) in a particular school. Another crucial oversight relates to socioeconomic inequity. Not all families can afford to choose. This perpetuates gaps in student achievement and future educational attainment because many disadvantaged families find themselves left with no choice but to enroll their children in failing public schools (Lubienski, Gulosino, & Weitzel, 2009). In this way, the Student-as-Consumer metaphor creates challenges for equitable reform and fails to address the need for students to be engaged in their education.

Student-as-Client

The Student-as-Product is a 19th-century perspective that equates people to parts in and products of an assembly line. The Student-as-Consumer is a 20th-century approach in which industry shifts from producing goods to producing the goods that consumers want to buy (McMillan & Cheney, 1996; Tight, 2013). Both metaphors fail to capture Dewey’s call for student engagement and responsibility in education. He recognizes “that education is not an affair of ‘telling’ and being told, but an active and constructive process,” in which the student is required to be a vital agent (1916, p. 38). Since the first two metaphors are rooted in an industrial vision of education, students are viewed as static, passive parts of the whole, unlike the dynamic, active agents that Dewey proposes.

Education, however, is not an industrial enterprise, and teachers are not assembly-line workers delivering a standard curriculum to turn out products of identically skilled students. Nor are teachers sales representatives whose primary goal is to sell a product — their school — that makes customers happy. Instead, teachers are service-sector professionals, just like physicians, attorneys, and mental health workers, who must cooperate with clients to achieve success. For example, a physician doesn’t produce a healthy individual or sell a specific health plan; the patient must play an active role in his/her health by exercising, eating healthfully, and following doctor recommendations. Similarly, students must not be seen as problems, products, or customers but valued as crucial partners in learning (Fullan, 2011; Weasmer & Woods, 2001; Zion, 2009). That means that we must view students as clients and collaborators in the education process (Carger, 1996; Tight, 2013).

Education is not an industrial enterprise, and teachers are not assembly-line workers delivering a standard curriculum to turn out products of identically skilled students.

Applying the Student-as-Client metaphor, teachers and students both have responsibilities to education. Empowered by their training and expertise, teachers will deliver engaging, differentiated lessons designed to meet state and federal academic standards and then use formative and summative assessments of student learning to inform future instruction. Students also are responsible for contributing to their own academic achievement and success. As Dewey argues, thinking can’t occur unless the individual is actively engaged in the material; students acquire knowledge through personal exploration, not by meeting external demands. Currently, the American education system and reform policies don’t value this crucial aspect of student responsibility. Consider Advanced Placement exams: School districts push students to take AP exams to promote college readiness and school esteem. Some even pay the associated fees to entice more students to take the assessments. This assumes students will put forth full effort to perform well. But many students rush through the exam without taking full advantage of the allotted time or, in some instances, they return empty answer booklets. From the Student-as-Product and Student-as-Consumer perspectives, a student’s test performance is a direct reflection of the teacher’s efficacy; the student bears no responsibility for his or her own efforts.

We don’t believe academic failure should be attributed solely to the teacher nor should this view be a deciding factor in education reform. Teachers should, of course, employ strategies to increase student engagement, but students also must expend energy to learn. This is what the Student-as-Client metaphor argues: Students can’t acquire knowledge by mere exposure. Rather, learners must be involved actively in exploring, investigating, and deepening their understanding of explicit instruction. If a student won’t do the required work, then even the most inspired teacher in the world can’t “make” him/her learn.

Conclusions and future considerations

Despite almost a century between them, both Dewey and Fullan recognize the importance of building a supportive environment for education and equitable change. Education is a social enterprise and reform comes from the cultivation of social capital, not just teacher capital. Building both teacher and student ownership in reform encourages a more systematic and collective mindset (Dewey, 1916; Fullan, 2011; Hamzah, Ismail, & Embi, 2010). Specifically, students must see value in being actively engaged with their learning and the reform process. All stakeholders must cultivate positive relationships among students, teachers, parents, scholars, policy makers, and the community with an eye toward connecting students with learning and education. If education reforms are going to improve student capacities for academic achievement and world citizenship, then students must have opportunities to practice responsibility, accountability for oneself, and democratic decision making (McMillan & Cheney, 1996). This is another dimension of the Student-as-Client metaphor.

Regrettably, student voices often go unheard in debates about school reform. As Hamzah and colleagues said, “In schools, we still try to teach [students] about life, but restrict their opportunity to participate in any decision making” (2010, p. 743).  Secondary school students also have expressed frustration in not being allowed to have a say in what happens in school, and that learning could be improved if they were included in the reform and decision-making processes (Zion, 2009). Literature in the field of positive youth development echoes these sentiments, along with results from the Gallup Student Poll (Lopez, 2011), which find that engaged K-12 students are highly involved with, enthusiastic, and hopeful about school. Engendering a generation of engaged and accountable students should be a primary focus and outcome of education reform. To achieve this, we must work to break down the social and structural norms — traditional markers for academic achievement and success, such as grades and test scores — that prevent the Student-as-Client metaphor from taking effect.

Many recent reforms focus on evaluating and improving teacher quality in the belief that learning will automatically occur when highly trained, effective teachers are placed in the classroom. The message to students is clear: Their learning is the direct responsibility of teachers, and they may sit back and passively receive the learning. Is it any wonder that we’re producing a generation of students reluctant to assume responsibility for their actions? We remain hopeful that policy makers will see the importance of student involvement and accountability in education, and we are encouraged by some movement in that direction. In 2009, President Obama told students that, “We can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, the best schools in the world — and none of it will make a difference, none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities, unless you show up to those schools, unless you pay attention to those teachers, unless you listen to your parents and grandparents and other adults, and put in the hard work it takes to succeed” (Obama, 2009). We wholeheartedly agree.

Metaphors can play a powerful role in shaping discourse, perceptions, and action. By explicating the Student-as-Client metaphor, we hope students and teachers can see the need to work together to achieve greatness in learning. This concept must be widely accepted before the U.S. can engage in policy making that will change education in ways that truly address the challenges of the emerging millennium.

References

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Carger, C. (1996). The metaphorical student. Educational Horizons, 75 (1), 15-19.

Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York, NY: Free Press.

Foundation for Excellence in Education. (2013). Reform agenda. http://excelined.org/about-us/reform-agenda/

Fullan, M. (2011, April). Choosing the wrong drivers for whole system reform. (Seminar Series Paper no. 204). East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia: Center for Strategic Education.

Hamzah, M.I., Ismail, A., & Embi, M.A. (2010). The importance of students’ views regarding educational change. Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences, 7, 738-744.

Lee, D.M. (1996). Revisioning the student as client, or better yet, the client as student. Educational Horizons, 75 (1), 36-40.

Lopez, S.J. (2011). The highs and lows of student engagement. Phi Delta Kappan, 93 (2), 72-73.

Lubienski, C., Gulosino, C., & Weitzel, P. (2009). School choice and competitive incentives: Mapping the distribution of educational opportunities across local education markets. American Journal of Education, 115, 601-647.

McMillan, J.J. & Cheney, G. (1996). The student as consumer: The implications and limitations of a metaphor. Communication Education, 45, 1-15.

Obama, B. (2009, September 8). Remarks by the president in a national address to America’s school children. Washington, DC: White House. www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-in-a-National-Address-to-Americas-Schoolchildren.

Ramirez, A. (1999). Assessment-driven reform: The emperor still has no clothes. Phi Delta Kappan, 81 (3), 204-208.

Riessman, F. (1988). The next stage in education reform: The student as consumer. Social Policy, 18 (4), 2.

Tight, M. (2013). Students: Customers, clients, or pawns? Higher Education Policy, 26, 291–307

Weasmer, J. & Woods, A. (2001). Encouraging student decision making. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 38 (1), 40-42.

Zion, S.D. (2009). Systems, stakeholders, and students: Including students in school reform. Improving Schools, 12 (2), 131-143.

CITATION: Mahatmya, D., Brown, R.C., & Johnson, A.D. (2014). Student-as-client. Phi Delta Kappan, 95 (6), 30-34.