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EAU at a glance
>> Affiliated
campuses situated in Africa and Asia
>> Online graduate school open to students worldwide
>> Online graduate school open to students worldwide
A distinctive approach
>> Flexible but
academically rigorous routes to a degree
>> Intended for mature, self-directed working adults
>> Internationally accredited
>> Intended for mature, self-directed working adults
>> Internationally accredited
The approach of European-American University
"Innovators
and creative geniuses cannot be reared in schools. They are precisely
the men who defy what the school has taught them."
[Source: Ludwig von Mises, "Human Action", p 311]
[Source: Ludwig von Mises, "Human Action", p 311]
What does European-American University mean when it refers to a business approach to education? Above all, it is an approach that places efficiency and market response at its heart. The market demands sustainable solutions to the problems facing today's world, with technology central to meeting those challenges. It also demands flexible learning methodologies that lead to a reliable outcome and that are not skewed by state-funded institutions seeking to protect a monopoly or to derive income from their students that is not reflected in sound value for money. The adult learner is disadvantaged by minimum enrolment periods where these are not justified by the amount of work that needs to be done in the program. They are likewise disadvantaged by the imposition of artificial limits on transfer of credit based on the age or number of credits concerned. Such processes do not assist in the recognition of learning, nor do they benefit the learner. They are designed to perpetuate the control of education by the university and ultimately by the state. If similar processes were applied in a business scenario subject to the free market, they would lead to rapid failure!
Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer teaches business at Stanford University. His conclusions on mainstream business education, published in "The End of Business Schools", were startling,
"Little of what is taught to
students in
business school prepares them for the corporate workplace. You have to
question what goes on in the two years it takes to get an MBA, if
someone can virtually be equivalent in two or three weeks. What that
suggests to me is that if you take a smart person, and give them a
relatively short course, a mini-MBA, if you will, they basically do as
well as the MBAs."
"One of the problems is that much of the business school curriculum has remained unchanged since the 1960s. Business schools rely on outmoded teaching methods and do not afford students an opportunity for practical experience."
"One of the problems is that much of the business school curriculum has remained unchanged since the 1960s. Business schools rely on outmoded teaching methods and do not afford students an opportunity for practical experience."
Emeritus Professor Russell Ackoff held the Anheuser-Busch Professorship of Management Science at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He was a leading critic of the system of tenure and the way traditional universities work to stifle innovation and dynamic change in their curriculum.
"Today, 6
years after they're hired, they get tenure or they're out. So now a 31-year-old
gets tenure and has 40 years or more of commitment from the university. Many of
these people get secure and retire intellectually at middle age; they stop
thinking. So to answer your question, we must get rid of subsidy and tenure if
we're going to get these institutions to change and improve the learning
process.
Tenure has become a protection of incompetence and that's the problem. It's a very difficult problem and I don't see it being solved any time soon. I tried to do it when I was at Wharton. I'd written an article attacking tenure and the local AAUP chapter attacked me. So I challenged the chapter to a test. I said let's hire a research firm acceptable to both of us to investigate the following question: Does tenure protect incompetence more than academic freedom? If it turns out it protects academic freedom more than incompetence, I'll pay for the research. If it turns out the other way, you'll pay for it. Well, they wouldn't take me up on it."
Tenure has become a protection of incompetence and that's the problem. It's a very difficult problem and I don't see it being solved any time soon. I tried to do it when I was at Wharton. I'd written an article attacking tenure and the local AAUP chapter attacked me. So I challenged the chapter to a test. I said let's hire a research firm acceptable to both of us to investigate the following question: Does tenure protect incompetence more than academic freedom? If it turns out it protects academic freedom more than incompetence, I'll pay for the research. If it turns out the other way, you'll pay for it. Well, they wouldn't take me up on it."
Dr. Ackoff once created a program at the Wharton Business School that worked just like many programs at European-American University. Here is what happened,
"We had a
program at the university that I created and ran in which there was no
curriculum, no classes, no examinations, no admission requirements—only exit
requirements—in which the students designed their own education, not only the
content but the process of it, and by the criteria that the university employed,
we were the most successful department in the business school, Wharton. Because
we had the largest number of doctoral candidates, the largest number of job
offers when they graduated, and they went out to high salaries. And yet we broke
all the rules. And that was a threat. In the university, the worst thing you can
do for the long run is to be successful while breaking rules. You can fail as
much as you want to, as long as you follow the rules. Then they can't blame you,
because you're following the rules. And if you succeed following the rules,
they'll tolerate that. But what they won't tolerate is your succeeding by
breaking the rules, because that's a challenge to the validity of the rules.
It's a threat to the status quo, and they don't want to change. So the easiest
way to handle that is to get rid of the thorn in their side."
Dr. Ackoff speaks to the issue of how to improve education,
"I think
it's fine as long as it focuses on learning instead of teaching, because there
is the implicit assumption in most educational institutions that learning is the
converse of teaching, that an ounce of teaching produces an ounce of learning.
The fact is that teaching is the major obstruction of learning. Most of what
you're taught you never use and is irrelevant, and what you do use you've
learned on the job, usually in an apprenticeship relationship. So the whole
concept of education as being taught is wrong. Kids learn in school and some
adults learn in university not because of the school or university, but in spite
of it. People learn from others by following their curiosity, but they learn
very little from courses. Certainly very little that is useful."
"...to think creatively about learning, every single aspect of the educational process ought to be questioned and systematically denied and the consequences explored. When considering how to improve learning, get rid of curriculum, get rid of courses, get rid of examinations, get rid of accreditation, get rid of degrees - and what would education look like? Compare the potential of this with what we currently have, from the point of view of stimulating effective learning. Until you do this, you'll never have transformation. That's the difference between transformation and reformation. Reformation is keeping the current system and modifying its behavior, with modest change. But given the potential we are not now realizing, I would argue for creative transformation that focuses more effectively on learning."
(Source)
"...to think creatively about learning, every single aspect of the educational process ought to be questioned and systematically denied and the consequences explored. When considering how to improve learning, get rid of curriculum, get rid of courses, get rid of examinations, get rid of accreditation, get rid of degrees - and what would education look like? Compare the potential of this with what we currently have, from the point of view of stimulating effective learning. Until you do this, you'll never have transformation. That's the difference between transformation and reformation. Reformation is keeping the current system and modifying its behavior, with modest change. But given the potential we are not now realizing, I would argue for creative transformation that focuses more effectively on learning."
(Source)
European-American University does not require that the student repeat what they can already show that they know and can do. Its efficiency in not retaining the system of tenured faculty that mainstream institutions maintain, nor in centring activities on a single main campus, means that significant cost savings can be passed directly on to the student, and that benefits consequently accrue for global sustainability. For many adult learners, the provision of university clubs, sports teams, common rooms and a substantial bureaucracy is irrelevant to their aims and desires in engaging with the educational process. European-American University uses the full resources of the Information Age to revolutionise the concept of the university for the twenty-first century and beyond.
"A...major
illusion on which the school system rests is that most learning is the
result of teaching. Teaching, it is true, may contribute to certain
kinds of learning under certain circumstances. But most people acquire
most of their knowledge outside school, and in school only insofar as
school, in a few rich countries, has become their place of confinement
during an increasing part of their lives."
Ivan Illich, "Deschooling Society"
Ivan Illich, "Deschooling Society"
