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Students: Customers, Clients or Pawns?

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Abstract

The metaphor of the student as a consumer or customer is widely used within contemporary higher education, and impacts on the ways in which students, academics and institutions behave. These, and a number of alternative metaphors for the student, are critically reviewed. The alternatives considered include both contemporary (student as client or as co-producer) and longstanding expressions (student as child, employer or apprentice). A new, and perhaps rather darker, metaphor, that of the student as a pawn, is then proposed. The usefulness of metaphors in higher education policy, and in analyses thereof, is considered.

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Tight, M. Students: Customers, Clients or Pawns?. High Educ Policy 26, 291–307 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1057/hep.2013.2

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