Within the past six months, pressure has mounted for reform within the for-profit education, as loan default rates have increased, along with higher attendance, and dissatisfaction in many other areas have become impossible to ignore. My abridged response to all this pending legislation is that it's about time. I've worked at Brown College for nearly three years, and have witnessed an inexorable march towards higher, more pressured admissions practices.
One student, to name an example of many, originally came with an interest in criminal justice but he couldn't pass his entrance test, after generously giving him numerous attempts. The test is easier to pass than a coloring book. Sample question: Reap is the opposite of_____? If you answered 'sow,' then you've got one of the fourteen pathetic points needed for admission. I would then call in my boss, and we would have this inanely bogus celebration for a kid whose IQ equivalency wouldn't allow him to operate a can-opener without adult supervision, to further coax them into applying.
I've stayed hours past my quitting time, working on radio audition scripts with people that can't read basic text, much less pronounce the word 'annihilate,' which seventy-five percent couldn't manage. Invariably, these types of students suffered from poor self-confidence (justifiably, I think), and wind up not calling back, or following-through with their enrollments. Then, I get blamed for not doing a better interview, or tour, or not selling the program effectively enough. I don't know how some of these people manage the basics of sustaining a life.
In fairness, Brown has many bright, talented, and capable students, and the quality of the students has increased since I started. I'm proud of the assistance of having provided an education to those who are truly ambitious, and for whom our programs provide the value for the high, private-school cost. One guy brought in his young son, pointed to me, and said 'that's the guy who got me into college.' I didn't know what to say, except to thank him for the compliment.
Admissions is about hitting numbers, and in sales, you're either making it, or you're shown the door. If I hit my goals, they raise them, and their expectations become unrealistically high. Reps are always walking the thin line between enrollments and ethics, and we're staffed fortunately with the sorts that can frequently reach the delicate compromise. Every hour, someone comes by to check on my dials, contacts, and appointment-setting. Sometimes people pick up the phone, are interested, and arrange meetings they intend to keep. Most people either ignore my calls, emails and letters, or tell me impudently to 'fuck off.'
Admissions is singularly the most uneven job I've ever worked. It never ends. With classes starting every five weeks, instead of four times a year, the pressure to get people through the doors is only more severe. From when I started, my job has devolved into telemarketing campaigns, where I've called on lists of applicants from three years ago, desperately trying to figure out what I'll tell them, if they answer the phone. 'Hello, I see that you inquired into our bullshit business management program back in 2005, but I just wanted to tell you that we now have medical billing and coding, and the demand for that is...*click*
My bosses get yelled at by corporate. I've heard it, actual yelling and screaming, like we're selling used cars, the benchmark for pushy salesmen. They in turn will walk like amphetamine-fueled Nazis into our offices, to reprimand us for not doing more, like it's somehow up to us why some impoverished, mentally deranged bus-rider didn't make it from South Minneapolis to Mendota Heights for their 9am appointment. If they miraculously manage to show up, on time for their interview, and don't enroll, I get talked-to about that. If they enroll, but never go through financial aid, I get talked-to about it.
Then, there's the 'no-walk' policy. Suppose a prospective student wants to think about it, and not make a snap-decision about dropping nearly seventy-thousand dollars to learn how to use Adobe Creative Suite. I have to go get my manager, who tries to wheedle the hesitant prospect into signing up before they leave. Their visits undermine every shred of professionalism I've summoned, and is like peering at the man behind the curtain, which taints their final impression of the college as being what they might have suspected: concerned chiefly with getting enrollments, regardless of the remaining doubts, questions and concerns of the student.
I get it, it's a business. I'm not naive about why it exists, but tactics like the increasing intensity and demands to enroll will eventually hurt the college's credibility, and will hopefully lead to reforms. Yet, it's already heading down a perilous path of surrendering righteousness to corporate shareholder demands for bigger bonuses. The president of Career Education Corporation in Chicago isn't worried about paying his rent, I'm sure. I used to be a proponent of privatization in education, but my experiences have forced a serious reconsideration.
Privately, every admissions representative has spoken of trying to find other alternatives, and to get distance from the high-pressure, insane managerial antics of motivation through equal portions of humiliation and embarrassment. Everybody is burned out, jaded and fatigued, and management knows it, but never address it. The average life-span of a rep is one, lowly year, and if that doesn't speak to the kind of working environment that's being foisted on employees, nothing else will.
I wish all my students the very best, and can sleep well at night, knowing that I never deliberately did anything to hinder their abilities to get the kind of quality education I promised during our meetings. It has also reaffirmed the reason why I'm going back to college in January, to move on, and put the daily histrionics behind me.
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