Does an Educational Institution Offer
Products or Services?
It primarily offers services.
1. It helps learners acquire knowledge, skills, and attitudes by:
a. Providing a forum in which learning may be facilitated, such as a classroom, web site with a threaded discussion board, etc.
b. Assembling a cohort of learners and appointing a facilitator (instructor). These become a community assisting each other in the acquiring knowledge, skills, and attitudes.
c. Pointing to sources information
d. Assisting the learners in understanding those sources
e. Sequencing the learning experience in a helpful and meaningful way.
f. Disciplining the learners by requiring that their efforts be performed in a given time frame and to a specified level of quality
2. It certifies to the learner and others that the learner has actually acquired the knowledge, skills, and attitudes by:
a. Grading assignments and courses against a meaningful standard.
b. Granting diplomas, degrees, transcripts, certificates, etc.
It also offers some products.
1. New findings from research.
2. New or revised explanations of things.
3. New or revised ways of doing things.
4. New concepts or ways of looking at things.
5. New structures for assisting learning, such as course, unit and lesson plans.
These are typically in the form of books, journal articles, web pages, lectures, etc.
It is interesting how well this fits with John Milton Gregory's Seven Laws particularly number five, the law of the learner. Click here for a summary. And the classic good practice statement for undergraduate education.
