A letter I wrote to management as a UOP Mil Division EA:
As a former service member and dealing with service members everyday at work. I am proud at what I can do for them because I am proud and grateful for what they do for my country. To provide a service member the ability to make themselves better, to educate them to provide them a basis of a better future because they are guaranteeing our future and freedom makes me very proud to be part of this division here.
It is that pride and sense of duty that has carried me here in the military division.
I find however, that is not what drives this division. It is the bottom line and that is to get as many students into the school in order to secure their money and funding for the benefit of the bottom line.
It is definitively apparent that our funding, our tuition and financial aid is geared towards maximizing a return and pushing the envelope of acceptability and affordability. It is quizzical that we compare ourselves to other brick and mortar schools and their tuition costs. But I have not seen one not one graph that displays the our tuition costs compared to other ONLINE Universities, Colleges or Degrees.
It is apparent that as a university that we seek to maintain two missions here, one is our accreditation in order to continue to secure the DOE funding from our students. And also to grow with as many students as possible and rewarding those individuals that do so. Education, knowledge and academic excellence is a secondary goal if tertiary goal in growth.
Yet, in that growth we address the loss in reputation from low admissions hurdles with an ever larger marketing machine to say that we are premiere. This is totally different from other organization who let OUTSIDE organizations rate and rank them or who allow for the growth and acceptance of their institution show by their merits. It is apparent we do so more so by our banner ads and marketing campaigns.
It is ironic that as a marketing major that I demean this process as it has been highly successful. But the marketing of the insinuation does not show the difficulty within which the future student must operate or enter this university. We have been told to set the right expectations. To do the students right. And we do so. But the minute they enter the university the services or the lack of services we provide become apparent.
It is not the fault of the individuals who provide the service but it is the fault of the institution who rewards MONTHLY goal makers and overworks, inundates EAs, FAs, ACs to the point where we cannot provide satisfactory service but focus on one thing - THE NUMBERS. And the numbers are rewarded.
It is interesting a colleague once told me that whoever drew up those numbers probably did so in a vacuum. There is no basis for the numbers and invariably 70% to 80% of the people in those positions do not make the numbers. It is also interesting that the rate of attrition is probably just as high.in a standard bell curve the numbers should be moved not the people. But the people are apparently the ones that are wrong and they are told so everyday. Everyday we focus on the monthly number because that is the most important number. At the cost of letting our students become numbers.
If one examines the challenges to students entering this university and maintaining their status in this university it is not the student that challenges themselves but the institution. Which on a purely academic level is totally acceptable. But prior to acceptance the REAL measure of acceptance to this university is not a person's academic experience or ability to perform BUT their financial viability to pay or secure financing to pay tuition.
Tuition that continues to rise. Why does UOP offer ground classes at less expensive tuition amount then the ONLINE? Is ONLINE not a less expensive business model since it is ONLINE? Yet we do so because we seek to push the envelope of financial viability for the sake of PROFITS.
THIS IS WHERE THE MISSION AND THE PRIORITIES CLASH. Education by its truest nature and virtue is not about PROFITS its about the spread of knowledge and then secondarily to seek the monetary benefits of that knowledge. We seek the monetary benefits before we provide knowledge and additionally we hold that service of knowledge hostage to students who cannot provide that priority to us - i.E. Tuition. Additionally, we provide not alternatives to help our students attain their education if only collections.
Our relationships with our ground and sister campus is strained at best and our systems and transferal ability is stodgy.
As a former service member serving other service members I am proud to do what I do here as an individual. But it shames to see that the drive of this division and most probably this institution is not to help people get an education but provide an alternative to education at the highest possible net gain to the institution at the cost of the individuals who work here and the student.
Sometime perhaps someone should speak the truth and not spout the virtues of a mission that is not real. The mission is essentially all in the students head, we only provide that option and facilitate it. But I never think we ever truly support it. The future will be very difficult for this institution. Because we are lacking on that service side. It is good to have many options here, many schools, many colleges, alternatives etc. And I think that is what will continue to make this school grow in the short term. But eventually, the support or service side of this university will be outsourced to people with more knowledge, dedication and training or it will the Achilles heel
0 comments