Are students customers?

As inter-university competition becomes greater and greater, schools across the country are bending over backwards to make themselves look attractive to the next round of high school graduates moving on to higher education. Tufts itself has made attempts to become a more "user-friendly" institution in the past few years, as evidenced in the construction of Dowling and the hiring of a Dean of Academic Services and Student Affairs.

The "Dean of Dowling" is gone now _ she left the school in August _ but the legacy of treating the "student as customer" continues. It was Dillon who revamped student services all across Tufts into an efficient and student-centered system, building Dowling Hall out of nothing.

But in the wake of her departure, the concept of student as customers remains unclear as the University struggles to define itself on a tightrope between service and education.

Paul Stanton is Dillon's temporary replacement as the Dean of Academic Services and Student Affairs, and he feels strongly that with the high level of competition between elite schools, Tufts needs to compete not just in academics, but in student services as well.

"It's many consumers shopping out the service," Stanton said. "There's a lot of pressure from the customer."

Stanton's office sits in the corner of Dowling Hall, where students have access to information booths and the Office of the Registrar, Career Services, Study Abroad Offices, the Dean of Students Office, and a number of administrators and assistants. Where previously these groups were spread across campus, today _ as a result of student input to create a friendlier and easier system _ they reside in one space.

Next to Stanton in Dowling Hall _ just one door over _ is Dean of the Colleges Charles Inouye's office. Today, Inouye has just finished speaking with a student for over an hour _ an example of what he thinks makes Tufts different from just any business. "Our relationship [professor and student] is not a customer-provider relationship," Inouye said. "I don't think in those terms at all."

The University relationship can be likened to that of a family, Inouye said. Economics is kept separate from the interpersonal ties.

Administrators say the school works on two different levels, providing education and services for students _ in the form of gyms, cafeterias, and shuttles. But where the dividing line is between the two worlds may be becoming blurred.

"It's hard for people in this 'buy off the shelf' attitude" to understand education, Inouye said. "The problem with this consumer mentality is that it makes a lot of false assumptions" on what is valuable, forgetting intangibles like friendship and personal growth.

But even Tufts' administrative side avoids becoming a business in how it accepts students. Many admitted are given financial aid and numbers are often limited. "If we were a business, you know how many students we would have here? All of them," University Professor and former Provost Sol Gittleman said. If Tufts wanted to maximize its profit, it would accept as many students as it could fit in the classroom.

The primary factor that prevents Tufts from ending up like a business is that, as a university, it was never meant to be efficient. Despite Tufts' high tuition, the University spends much more per student than it takes in _ over $10,000. But should the University start to worry if this rise in costs is sustainable financially?

"We've become like a mall, almost... we spend a lot on non-educational things," Gittleman said. "It's too much... that's as far as I want to go" with facility growth.

But it was that emphasis that attracted many students to Tufts in the first place, and many say the University needs all the different facilities and services which the school has to offer.

"What do you define education as?" junior Valerie Wencis asked while sitting in the campus center studying. It was "definitely the total package" that led her to Tufts, saying that a university is more than just a classroom education. Having spaces available like the campus center were part of the reason she came here, not just the academics.

And, the Senate trustee representatives all promised in their campaign to promote completion of phase three of the campus center. Many students believe that space and facilities have an effect on community-building and on the amount of pride students take in Tufts.

Gittleman now works a floor below where he used to in Ballou when he was provost, but that hasn't prevented him from maintaining a vision of what Tufts should be. "There's been a change in the attitude in the students," Gittleman said.

In his 30 years of experience teaching at Tufts, Gittleman has noticed a trend towards students demanding more and more, even expectations of better grades because the financial price has been paid.

"Society has created an atmosphere of service to people who expect a level of service," Gittleman said. "Universities have somehow slipped into that." He pointed out a page in a book off his shelf, mentioning how students at University of Pennsylvania can appeal their grades to a university body, a concept he finds ridiculous.

"If that is higher education, I don't want any part of it," Gittleman said. "That sense that the faculty is here to serve" is wrong.

The reverse is also true for some, as students can feel sometimes that the school becomes a business when it comes to financial cases. Wencis said that she feels "the school needs to act like a business sometimes" because of its low endowment, making it more dependant on student fees and tuition.

Junior Alex Levy had the same perspective of the school, but doesn't think there's anything wrong with it. "If it seems like they're eager to make money where they can, it's because they are," Levy said. "Money from students is a big source of income."

The concept of student as customer doesn't mean that the school is trying to take advantage of its consumers, Stanton says. In fact, Stanton argues that this perspective makes the University more interested in making sure that students are happy.

"We maintain that customer-service relationship for a long time," Stanton said. "It's all part of that customer-service perspective. You don't lose them."