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This is a classic problem. You have a situation where the quality of the thing (in this case teaching) isn't easily known ahead of time, so the success of the
by pmichaud 10y ago
This is a classic problem.
You have a situation where the quality of the thing (in this case teaching) isn't easily known ahead of time, so the success of the organization isn't dependent on the quality of teaching, but instead is dependent on the quality of marketing (roughly).
So now you have a bunch of organizations with limited resources competing in the same space, and we'd like it if the organizations who provided the best education were winning. And providing a good education isn't opposed to also having good marketing, in principle.
The problem is that the organizations that try to be good at both teaching and marketing are competing against organizations that are trying to ONLY be good at marketing. The marketing organization will tend to win over time because it's easier to be good at one instead of being good at both, and the organizations that are just good at teaching die because they are bad at marketing.
tldr; Teaching is hard. Marketing is hard. Both at the same time is hard squared.
- gohrt 10y agoYou're missing a key component: ITT and Phoenix recruit students who don't gain admission to any other public and private schools, a group that is generally of lower general intelligence and critical thinking ability than other college students, and more susceptible to marketing lies. These schools are unlike competitive non-profit and public colleges, in that they are delighted to enroll wholly unqualified students.
- wtvanhest 10y agopmichaud is likely referring to just the market place of technical schools like ITT/Phoenix etc. and not comparing them to competing with public/private colleges. The ecosystem for HVAC schools is a competitive one where the winning HVAC program gains on the losers through a marketing advantage, not a teaching advantage.