Donald Hiscock | Articles | The Guardian
When administration manager Murray Whelk has a
bright idea about trimming the college’s costs we all sit up and listen.
For his latest idea it was a case of fasten seat belts, put your chairs in
the upright position and make sure your briefcase is stowed safely under the
desk in front.
Murray thought that what seemed to work in the
competitive world of civil aviation might work in the less than civil world
of further education. What Murray had not taken into account was that aeroplanes
actually take off in one place and then land somewhere else. In other words,
they reach a destination. It felt like our college was still trying to find
its way to the runway let alone ever achieve a cruising speed.
But a No Frills college, we are told, is the way
forward. This in itself is a novel idea for most of us, who feel like we have
been going backwards for many years. Any idea that involves a sense of direction
must be a good one, even if it comes without a packet of complimentary peanuts.
“ What does he mean, no thrills?” enquired my mate Colin from maths.
“That’s what we’ve got already.”
Knowing Colin’s fear of flying I left him in a state of comfortable
ignorance.
For Murray, using the internet is at the heart
of his business plan. Students will be encouraged to enrol online. Most operations
will be carried out electronically and with a bit of luck we wont have to
talk to any punters until they arrive in the classroom, when all we’ll
have to do is greet them at the door, show them to their seats, instruct them
on to how to adopt the brace position in case an inspector visits and then
point out where the emergency exits are located.
Murray’s mantra is customer service. He reckons
that if we put all our efforts into pleasing the customer so that they get
where they want to be quickly and without any fuss, then we can steal business
from those colleges offering full service. I suppose he is referring to the
type of college that has a library with a mountain of unused resources taking
up space. What the customer wants instead, claims Murray, is more shops. So
when a student is not in his lesson he can be shopping at duty free prices.
When I asked Murray about the impact this plan
would have on staffing he assured me that there would be no job losses. However,
he did mutter something about the re-assignment of roles. Embracing Murray’s
metaphor, I can see my role as a member of the cabin crew. I will be at the
sharp end of customer or student satisfaction, dealing with the problems that
an irate passenger (sorry, student) throws at me. Come to think of it, it’s
exactly the same as what I do now. Perhaps, for Colin, his own distinctive
style of no frills teaching will fit seamlessly into this new regime.
It won’t take long to get used to pushing
a trolley up and down the rows of desks selling a choice of savoury text books,
low-fat writing implements and easy to digest schemes of work. I’m sure
that I will be able to keep a corporate smile throughout a period of sustained
turbulence. I will even be able block out Murray’s voice as he comes
over the loudspeaker at the end of every lesson thanking students for choosing
to learn with Air Whelk.
And thank you for making Furthermore part of your reading plan for today.
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